The EU, Ukraine and Russia discussed gas transit

On Tuesday, Berlin hosted a Russian-Ukrainian meeting on the topic of expiration of a gas transit contract at the end of the next year. The European Union was the mediator. Russia was represented by the heads of the Ministry of Energy and Gazprom Alexander Novak and Alexey Miller, Ukraine was represented by the Minister of Foreign Affairs Pavlo Klimkin and the head of Naftogaz Andriy Kobolev. The Vice-President of the European Commission for Energy Union said that this was a positive start to the tripartite process, which will resume on a technical and then on a political level in autumn: “All participants demonstrated their determination to focus on the future”, said Maroš Šefčovič. “They will send their high-quality experts to the talks in September. Discussion of the issues will continue at our level in October”. A member of the Oxford Institute for Energy Studies said that the European Union provides political support to Ukraine while being in a strong economic dependence on gas supplies from Russia: “The question for EU citizens is now how we will receive Russian gas after 2019, if there is no new contract”, Thierry Bros said. “Therefore, the European Commission has made great efforts to seat the two sides at the table and begin to search for political and economic solutions”. The EU receives 32% of its gas from Russia. It wants Ukraine to continue making money on its transit to raise its economy. And Russia, apparently, expects to direct its gas bypassing Ukraine, in particular through the Nord Stream-2 pipeline. Both countries are in a state of conflict because of Russia’s annexation of the Crimea and destabilization of the East of Ukraine. Source: Euronews