Putin: Ukraine Will Have to Pay In Advance For Russian Gas

[uhnope]

Source: AP/ Huff Post

MOSCOW (AP) — Russia has ratcheted up pressure on Ukraine, with President Vladimir Putin saying in a letter released Thursday that it only will deliver gas to its struggling neighbor next month if it pays in advance.

Putin first warned of the move in April in a letter to European leaders whose nations are customers of Russian state-controlled Gazprom natural gas giant. He said that Moscow would switch to pre-paid deliveries if Ukraine, which serves as a major conduit for Russian gas supplies to Europe, failed to start settling its mounting gas debt.

In the second letter released by the Kremlin Thursday, Putin said that a meeting involving Russian, Ukrainian and the European Union officials has failed to settle the issue. He said that Ukraine's gas debt to Russia has kept rising and reached $3.5 billion, even though Ukraine has received $3.2 billion bailout from the International Monetary Fund.

"Given the circumstances, the Russian company has issued an advance invoice for gas deliveries to Ukraine, which is completely in accordance with the contract, and after June 1 gas deliveries will be limited to the amount prepaid by the Ukrainian company," Putin said in the letter.

Read more: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/05/15/putin-ukraine-gas_n_5330251.html

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As the Czar of a militarized giant dictatorship turns the screws on a small country, invading it piecemeal.

[Bosonic]

2. Slovak PM: Russia says gas to Europe via Ukraine could be stopped

Slovak PM: Russia says gas to Europe via Ukraine could be stopped

BRATISLAVA, May 15 (Reuters) - Russian President Vladimir Putin has informed multiple European states that gas supplies to Europe through Ukraine may be halted as of June 1 if Kiev does not pay its bills, Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico said on Thursday.

Fico, speaking to reporters after meeting NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen, said the most pressing threat facing Slovakia was the question of deliveries from Russia that pass through Ukraine.

"Today, multiple member states including Slovakia were informed by President Putin that as of June 1, if Ukraine does not pay for supplied gas, it will not be supplied to the European territory," Fico said. "It is a serious threat to the energy security of Slovakia."

Putin's declaration, released by the Kremlin on Thursday, said there was a problem with Ukraine's debt for gas and insufficient levels of storage in Ukraine, and that over the past month there has been no movement on resolving the issue.

http://www.trust.org/item/20140515181820-9kewa

[uhnope]

4. it's one big shakedown.

Putin's puppet government in Ukraine agreed to the "debt" and now that the puppet government has been overthrown the west will end up paying Russia.

Just like the Soviets before 1989 and the Russian gov after 1989, directing all money streams directly into their own pockets. Remember Sergei Magnitsky.

[Bosonic]

6. Europe should wean itself off Russian energy ASAP

Pay Putin short-term if need be, make long term plans to shut Russia out.

Let Russia scramble to sell to China in an increasingly renewable energy world.

[dipsydoodle]

3. Don't pay - don't get

aka that's life so deal with it.

[pampango]

9. Austerity from the east; austerity from the west.

Ukraine owes Russia billions for past gas. It owes the West billions in debt. Both want to be paid. Life will be very difficult whether they get IMF loans, Russia is paid its gas debt and the gas keeps flowing or they don't get IMF loan and the gas is cut off. Sounds like austerity is coming from one direction or the other or both - in the very near future.

I hope their long term future is a more positive on, because short term it does not look good.

[Nihil]

11. Fail to see why this concept is apparently so controversial.

It's not as if Ukraine are asking for "a little credit to tide them over until next pay day",
they already owe Russia billions for deliveries that have been made and consumed.

Yet they seem to think that this can go on forever?

[polly7]

12. Exactly.

Over a month ago, on April 10, Putin sent a crucial letter to the 18 heads of state (five of them outside of the EU) whose countries import Russian gas via Ukraine. He was more than explicit; Moscow could not by itself keep financing the about-to-default Ukrainian economy. Between discount after discount and failing to impose penalty after penalty, since 2009 Moscow has subsided Kiev to the tune of an astonishing $35.4 billion. Europeans, Putin wrote, would also have to come to the table.

That spectacular nullity, outgoing European Commission (EC) President Jose Manuel Barroso, although agreeing a dialogue is necessary, answered that Gazprom's new rule of only allowing gas to flow to Ukraine if paid in advance was "worrying". As if any European energy major would gladly dismiss unpaid bills.

Ukraine: The Waiting Game
By Pepe Escobar
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article38487.htm

[independentpiney]

5. Fully understandable and well within their rights

Your tired hyperbole of a comment doesn't even warrant a response.

[Warren Stupidity]

7. The IMF money is going to be a direct transfer to Russia.

Funny thing that. Of course the other part of the IMF bailout is that it is coming with the usual strings forcing austerity on Ukraine. The new government in Kiev is going to have an awful year.

[dipsydoodle]

8. Part of the purpose of the IMF and EU loans was to pay off current debts.

The EU energy minister haa already said that the gas debt MUST be cleared

By and and large its say hello to your new owners - mugs.

[dipsydoodle]

10. Kiev Demands Return of 2Bln Cubic Meters of Russian Gas Left in Crimea Storage

KIEV, May 15 (RIA Novosti) – Ukraine’s energy ministry has demanded that Russia hand over two billion cubic meters of gas stored at an underground facility in Crimea, which it said belongs to the state-run Ukrainian gas major Naftogaz.

“In the territory of Crimean peninsula ... there are two billion cubic meters in the storage of Chernomornaftogaz, that are an economic property of Naftogaz,” Ukrainian Deputy Energy Minister Ihor Didenko said Thursday.

Didenko proposed Russian energy giant Gazprom transfer the gas to another facility in mainland Ukraine.

The demand comes despite Naftogaz having outstanding $3.5 billion debts for Russian gas, which Kiev refuses to pay with gas prices set at $485 per thousand cubic meters. On April 1, the price of Russian gas for Ukraine rose to $485 per thousand cubic meters from $268.50, as Russia withdrew two major discounts.

http://en.ria.ru/world/20140515/189846200/Kiev-Demands-Return-of-2Bln-Cubic-Meters-of-Russian-Gas-Left-in.html

Ah ha - the old we've not paid for it but its ours scam . No doubt a Gazprom spokes person said "fuckofski"

Same link :

On Wednesday, it said there was a risk that the Ukrainian state-run gas company could fail to fulfill its commitments on gas transit, siphoning off gas destined for European consumers.

Yes they've been suspected / accused of weeding in the past.