Ukraine Pleads Gas Case to Europe

Ukraine sought support Friday in European capitals a day after Russia cut off gas supplies and hardened its stance on prices.

Russia's natural gas monopoly Gazprom headquarters Moscow, Russia, Wednesday, Dec. 31, 2008....

Russia's natural gas monopoly Gazprom headquarters Moscow, Russia, Wednesday, Dec. 31, 2008. Russia's state gas monopoly Gazprom said Wednesday that Ukraine has threatened to seize gas intended for European customers if no deal is reached on gas shipments to Ukraine starting Jan. 1, 2009.

(Sergey Ponomarev/AP Photo)

Russia's Foreign Ministry issued a statement saying that it, too, was ready to explain its position in the dispute to Europe, asking for a special session of the European Commission to address the question.

But there were no face-to-face talks between Ukraine and Russia as of late afternoon Friday, a day after Russia's state-controlled energy giant Gazprom cut off gas to Ukraine, saying it had failed to pay an outstanding $2.1 billion bill.

For the moment, the two countries instead fought a public relations war.

A Ukrainian delegation headed by Energy Minister Yuriy Prodan, and including the deputy chief of gas company Naftogaz, Volodymyr Chuprun, visited Prague, the Czech Republic, and Bratislava, Slovakia, on its way to Brussels for meetings with officials.

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"Our aim is to explain our position to our European partners on the situation which arose in the gas sphere," Bohdan Sokolovsky, energy adviser to Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko, told The Associated Press in a telephone interview from Bratislava. "We are informing them on how the negotiations are going, we are stating our negotiating position."

Sokolovsky said Ukraine was trying to reassure its neighbors that it would not interrupt gas supplies.

"We told them that Ukraine is fulfilling all of its transit obligations and they have no doubts about that," he said.

Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Alexander Grushko said Friday Russia was ready to go to Brussels as well to make its case to the European Union.

Many in the West viewed a 2006 Russian cutoff of gas to Ukraine as an effort to punish Ukraine's political leaders for their pro-Western policies.

That cutoff, which temporarily affected supplies to Europe, also led to accusations that Russia was an unreliable source of energy and led to calls for greater energy independence from Moscow.