Brussels: Ukraine Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk said on Tuesday his government would take Russia to court unless it agreed to a gas supply contract based on market prices.
As tensions mount with Russia over its supply of gas to and through Ukraine onto Europe, Yatsenyuk said Kiev wanted Moscow to settle their differences by basing the contract on 'market conditions.'
”If Russia rejects this, then we (will) bring Russia to court in Stockholm,” the Swedish capital where Russian gas giant Gazprom has taken Ukraine to the international arbitration court in previous disputes.
“If I am not mistaken, they have 20 days left. This is the final call to Russia to sit at the negotiating table and find the solution,” he said.
Flanked by European Commission head Jose Manuel Barroso after talks in Brussels, Mr Yatsenyuk added that if Russia cut the price back to the fairer $286 from the $485.5 per 1,000 cubic metres it charges now then Ukraine “will urgently pay (its) gas bill arrears,” meeting a key Russian demand.
Gazprom said earlier on Tuesday that Ukraine had until June 2 to pay $1.6 billion owing or Moscow would halt supplies.
Mr Yatsenyuk also charged that after annexing Crimea in March, Russia has stolen “tens of hundreds of billions of dollars” in Ukrainian property. “They have stolen our fields; they have stolen our companies; they have stolen our onshore and offshore drills. We will see Russia in court,” he said.
In April, Russian President Vladimir Putin sent a letter to the top 18 European countries warning them that gas supplies could be interrupted and urging them to help pay Ukraine’s debts. The EU depends on Russia for a quarter of its gas supplies, with about half of that amount transiting Ukraine.
Meanwhile, Seven Ukrainian soldiers were killed in a rebel ambush in the restive east of the country on Tuesday, the defence ministry and security sources said, in one of the deadliest days for the military since the uprising started
