JSC Naftogaz of Ukraine is not ready to negotiate a contract on gas transit rates after 2019 in a bundle with possible amicable agreements related to the disputes considered by the Arbitration Institute of the Stockholm Chamber of Commerce, CEO of Naftogaz Andriy Kobolev has said.
“We do not see any point in this. Theoretically, we could consider it with some other counterparts, but we know Gazprom too well and remember the history of the negotiations in 2014. That’s exactly why we went to the arbitration court, as we had failed to reach an amicable agreement,” he told Interfax-Ukraine on Tuesday.
According to him, discussing these two subjects in a bundle and bringing them up for discussion in a trilateral format is a waste of time for EU representatives.
“And now, when Gazprom has lost and wants to talk about an amicable settlement, it’s just a waste of time. Our position is: we can consider your proposals as for an amicable deal, but they definitely should not mingle with negotiations on a new contract, and we are definitely not ready to do it in a trilateral format, wasting our partners’ time, and allowing [the Russian side] to say that we are negotiating something while they are preparing a springboard for Nord Stream 2,” Kobolev noted.
As reported, Russian President Vladimir Putin earlier said that if the dispute between PJSC Gazprom (Russia) and Naftogaz in the Stockholm Arbitration Court had been settled, the Russian Federation would be prepared to extend the contract for the transit of Russian gas to the EU through Ukraine.
Naftogaz considers that the two disputes with Russia’s Gazprom, which have already been granted awards by the Arbitration Institute of the Stockholm Chamber of Commerce, have been settled.
