Leader of the Liberal Democratic Party of Russia (LDPR) faction in Russia's State Duma, Vladimir Zhirinovsky, has said that there can be no talk of making natural gas supplies free of charge to Ukraine.
“There can be no talk of getting gas for free. Everyone has to pay
for everything,” Zhirinovsky said at a press conference entitled “Russia
– Ukraine: Calculated European Neighborliness or Slavic Alliance?” at
Interfax-Ukraine on Monday.
He added that the Soviet ideology that “someone feeds another one” is
in the past. “One doesn’t even have to help relatives anymore!” he
said.
Russia’s gas company Gazprom earlier confirmed that it has sent a $7
billion bill to Ukrainian state oil and gas company Naftogaz Ukrainy for
importing less natural gas last year than agreed.
