Ukraine is not going to buy Russian gas at a price proposed by Moscow

Ukraine will not agree to buy Russian gas in the third quarter at a price of $ 177 per thousand cubic meters, which in Moscow was previously called "comfortable" and "relevant market". The price proposed by Moscow is overstated, and Russian gas is still more expensive than European. About this, according to UNIAN , said the director of the business development "Naftogaz of Ukraine" Yuri Vitrenko on his page on the social network Facebook.

Vitrenko noted that, according to Thursday data, the cost of European gas for July was below $ 173. “Therefore, in such conditions, we will not buy gas from Gazprom at all. We will buy all the necessary gas in the European market. Fortunately, we have no problems with this,” the Ukrainian top manager writes.

The fact that the price of Russian gas "remains at the level of even above German hubs," according to Yuri Vitrenko, it will be a "sufficient argument" in the Stockholm arbitration, where Naftogaz filed a claim with a claim to revise the price.

Earlier this week, the head of the Ministry of Energy of Russia, Alexander Novak, said that the price of Russian gas for Ukraine in the second quarter of 2016 is $ 177 per thousand cubic meters.

“We believe that in the second quarter the price that develops today is absolutely comfortable without discounts, and it corresponds to the market situation,” the Minister of RIA Novosti quoted on Wednesday evening. Novak also stated that the price of the third quarter will become known in the second half of June.

Recall that having redeemed the mandatory volume of gas for $ 540 million stipulated by agreements, Kiev on November 25, 2015 stopped the purchase of gas from Russia. At the same time, Ukraine continues to purchase transit gas in the European Union according to the reverse, stating that its price is lower than that of Russia. Since 2014, the parties are sued in Stockholm arbitration regarding points of the long -term contract for the supply of Russian gas to Ukraine.

The Minister of Fuel and Energy of Ukraine Volodymyr Demchishin in March noted that the country can do without Russian gas supply, but will not refuse tripartite negotiations (through the mediation of the European Commission) on the conditions of fuel supply in 2016.

"With certain commercial offers, it would be thoughtlessly refused negotiations. It is necessary to at least listen to the Russian side," Demchishin said.

According to the Minister of Energy of Ukraine, in the spring the country consumed about 120 million cubic meters of gas per day, of which 10 million cubic meters pass through reverse schemes with Western Europe, and 60 million is chosen from its own underground storage facilities. In 2015, Ukraine imported 10.3 billion cubic meters of gas against 6.1 billion from Russia from Europe.