Scant details have emerged about the Sept. 24 meeting between Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych and Russia’s two leaders, but both sides made statements one day later suggesting that progress had been made in their thorny energy relations.
In a statement issued on his presidential website a day after holding talks with his Russian counterpart, Dmitry Medvedev, and Prime Minister Vladimir Putin at a presidential residence in Zavidovo of Russia’s Tverskaya Oblast, Yanukovych claimed that "progress" was made.
“During our talks, significant progress was achieved which gives reason to hope that concrete results in the interests of both countries will be achieved in the near future,” he said.
Late on Sept. 25, Natalia Timakova,a spokesperson for Russia’s president, confirmed Yanukovych’s version of events. She said that Ukrainian Energy Minister Yuriy Boyko had that day held a round of negotiations with the leadership of Russian natural gas giant Gazprom to followup on preliminary agreements made between Yanukovych and Russia’s leaders.
One day earlier, the Russian press service released photos showing Yanukovych, in suit and overcoat, walking and trailing behind Medvedev and Putin, who were more casually dressed in jeans and dark sport jackets.
Public statements issued on Sept. 24 on Yanukovych’s official website, www.president.gov.ua, acknowledged the strains between the two close neighbors and did not mention any agreements.
Yanukovych was quoted as saying during the meeting with Medvedev that important issues have piled up between Russia and Ukraine which need to be solved, starting with energy relations.
During the talks with Medvedev, Yanukovych stressed that constructive resolutions need to be found.
“I do not hide that there is concern over the energy question, but I am certain that in light of what we have achieved in the last year and a half – stabilizing bilateral economic relations and much more – that here we will be right and constructive in solving this issue," Yanukovych is quoted as saying to Medvedev.
Yanukovych called upon both countries to hold the next Ukrainian-Russian bilateral cooperation commission in Donetsk, his hometown, later this autumn.
Medvedev is quoted by Yanukovych’s press service as saying: "Of course, there is reason to discuss the most complicated of issues, including the energy one. Here [at Zavidovo] we have a nice atmosphere to discuss the most complicated issues"
The press services say Yanukovych and Medvedev talked for 20 minutes; Putin arrived later. Afterwards, the trio reportedly walked to a pond stocked with trout with three fishing poles set aside for them. They continued discussions and went to an outdoor terrace and a table covered with wine, crayfish and a samovar for making tea.
Ukraine wants a steep discount in the price it is paying for Russian natural gas – to $230 per 1,000 cubic meters from the current $355. Yanukovych also wants his nation to pursue a free-trade agreement with the European Union, something that would preclude Ukraine joining a Russian-led customs union.
Russia, on the other hand, says Ukraine is paying a fair market price for its natural gas and that further discounts would require Yanukovych to abandon the EU free trade hopes in favor of joining a customs union with Russia, Belarus and Kazakhstan.
