Yatsenyuk voiced an ultimatum to Putin: if you don’t reduce the price, we won’t pay for gas
Kyiv, June 11 (Navigator, Mikhail Ryabov) – Ukrainian Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk reiterated his refusal to fulfill the gas supply contract signed by Yulia Tymoshenko.
The official said this at a government meeting.
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“I have just completed negotiations with Naftogaz... The Russians made us an offer to reduce the price of gas by $100 with a so-called discount. I immediately want to officially declare that we know these Russian traps, the discount is established by a decision of the government of the Russian Federation and is removed by a decision of the government of the Russian Federation.
Therefore, our proposal was, is and remains the same: changes to the contract. If gas is a political weapon, then it is clear that the political weapon is in the hands of the Russian government. And if gas, as throughout the world, is a commodity, then we trade on the basis of a contract, and not on the basis of whether Russia likes the Ukrainian government or not.
To put it mildly, we have many more questions for the Russian government than vice versa. Therefore, we remain in the positions we were in - we rewrite the contract, accept the market price. The market price is not a market price, but a market price,” Yatsenyuk said.
He clarified that Ukraine considers it necessary to repay debts to Russia at a reduced price, and not the one specified in the contract.
“We paid at the price that we consider to be the market price, this is $268 per thousand cubic meters of gas - an indisputable amount of debt, we transferred $786 million, we are ready to pay off all the debt at the appropriate market price. And all these traps and hooks that Russia wants to again offer to Ukraine in order to keep us in line again are unacceptable, we will not step on the same rake twice.
Therefore, we once again call on Russia to please sign an agreement in order not to bring our case to court. Negotiations are taking place in a trilateral format with the participation of our European partners. They have just started again. This is already the third round of negotiations,” Yatsenyuk said.
Yatsenyuk issued an ultimatum to Putin: if you don't lower the price, we won't pay for gas.