You're reading: Yushchenko: Moscow backing Tymoshenko to create gas transportation consortium

Ivano-Frankivsk, December 10 (Interfax-Ukraine) – Ukrainian President Victor Yushchenko has said that Russia is supporting candidate for Ukrainian president and Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko with the goal of creating a gas transportation consortium.

"Tymoshenko is not a stupid person, as she understands that talks held with Russia in this context [driving NJSC Naftogaz Ukrainy to bankruptcy and creating a gas transportation consortium] have one political makeweight – nobody supports candidate for Ukrainian president Tymoshenko as strongly as Russia," he said on regional television in Ivano-Frankivsk on Dec. 10.

Yushchenko said that Naftogaz owns around 30,000 kilometers of gas and oil pipelines and other transit routes.

He said that the gas supply agreements signed by Naftogaz and Russia’s Gazprom are bringing Naftogaz to bankruptcy and that this could result in the creation of a gas transportation consortium on the basis of the Ukrainian gas transit system.

"NJSC Naftogaz Ukrainy is currently a company that does not formally exist, but it is in fact bankrupt," Yushchenko said.