Ukraine backs off from EU-brokered Russia gas deal

War-torn Ukraine has distanced itself from an EU-brokered agreement with Russia that would have restored its gas supplies during winter and helped rebuild trust between the neighbouring foes. EU Energy Commissioner Guenther Oettinger emerged from hours of acrimonious negotiations in Berlin on Friday to pronounce the three-month dispute on the verge of being resolved. He and Russia’s energy minister added that a final agreement could be signed after consultations in Moscow and Kiev next week. But Ukraine’s top energy officials vowed on Saturday to keep fighting over both the gas price and Moscow’s claim that Kiev owed it billions of dollars in debt.

No final decision was adopted. Not a single document was signed - period.

Naftogaz state energy firm chief Andriy Kobolev, in a Facebook post.

A deal would not only save Ukraine from adopting drastic energy savings measures in freezing weather but also ensure that Russian gas flows uninterrupted to European homes further down the pipeline. Yet the meeting came with trust between all sides lacking and any remaining goodwill between Moscow and Kiev dependent on the fate of a fragile truce in a pro-Russian uprising in eastern Ukraine that has claimed more than 3,200 lives. Russia froze natural gas deliveries to Ukraine in June. Ukraine’s pipeline transmits just 15 percent of the Russian gas imported by Europe. But EU powers such as Italy, reliant on the Ukrainian link for all their Russian supplies, fear that Kiev may be forced to tap into those flows once the winter heating season begins.

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