You're reading: Front for Change leader thinks Ukrainian-Russian gas talks unpromising

The leader of the Front for Change Party and Ukrainian MP, Arseniy Yatseniuk, is of the view that the gas negotiations between his country and Russia do not show promise.

"Before the presidential elections [in Russia], I don’t see the possibility of a positive finale to the gas negotiations. Moreover, this is not gas negotiation, this is pure Russian blackmail," Yatseniuk said in an exclusive interview with Interfax-Ukraine.

The Russians have applied a very simple method – drawing out the talks, Yatseniuk said. "Russia says it is ready to agree, but only the Ukrainians are not prepared. They draw out the time and every month make an additional $500 million," he said, adding that in his view Russia has deliberately set terms unacceptable to Ukraine.

Ukraine has to quickly diversify its sources of energy, he said.

Over the past two years, Ukraine has prepaid Russia $7 billion for delivered natural gas, Yatseniuk said.

"For $7 billion we could have been able to build two LNG [liquefied natural gas] terminals. For that money over two years we could in every region have reconstructed residential and communal business. Over that time and with that money we could have launched a major program for modernizing thermal power stations and get away from the excessive use of gas. And lastly, with that money we could have modernized Ukraine’s gas-transport system, replace gas re-pumping stations and change them over to electricity, resulting in savings of 7 billion cubic meters of gas," Yatseniuk said.

All the bases for such reforms were prepared back in 2005 by the Economy Ministry, Yatseniuk said.

"But instead, we chose the easiest route – to do nothing, to have result-free negotiations, to take money from the IMF [International Monetary Fund] to settle up with Russia’s Gazprom, to enrich Russia’s Gazprom," he said.