Category: Ukraine

The Russian Ministry of Industry and Trade said Friday it was reviewing options to build ships for liquefied natural gas transport at Crimean ports.The government said a number of shipbuilding companies in Crimea and Sevastopol are either idled or working at below capacity. "One of the options for filling the bag orders of the shipbuilding yards is being developed by the Ministry of Industry and Trade, and it is the possibility of building LNG carriers for shipping liquefied natural gas from the Russian arctic oil fields," the ministry said . A former Soviet republic, Ukraine has tilted toward the European Union following a November uprising. Last month, Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a treaty to annex Crimea, a peninsula of Ukraine, and geopolitical and military tensions continue to escalate . Crimean officials have said Russian energy company Gazprom aims to tap into the more […]

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The Russian Ministry of Industry and Trade said Friday it was reviewing options to build ships for liquefied natural gas transport at Crimean ports.The government said a number of shipbuilding companies in Crimea and Sevastopol are either idled or working at below capacity. "One of the options for filling the bag orders of the shipbuilding yards is being developed by the Ministry of Industry and Trade, and it is the possibility of building LNG carriers for shipping liquefied natural gas from the Russian arctic oil fields," the ministry said . A former Soviet republic, Ukraine has tilted toward the European Union following a November uprising. Last month, Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a treaty to annex Crimea, a peninsula of Ukraine, and geopolitical and military tensions continue to escalate . Crimean officials have said Russian energy company Gazprom aims to tap into the more […]

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DTEK, the Ukrainian energy company led by the nation’s richest man, said customers in Crimea run the risk of power cuts after they didn’t fully pay for electricity they consumed in March. Companies and organizations owe Krymenergo, DTEK’s Crimean unit, 741 million Hryvnia ($64.4 million), the company with offices in Kiev and Donetsk said in a statement on its website today. DTEK is controlled by Rinat Akhmetov , who has a personal fortune of about $11.9 billion, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. “The main condition of supplying power to the peninsula is 100 percent payment in Ukraine ’s currency,” according to the statement. The unit isn’t authorized to supply customers if it hasn’t received payment, Dmitriy Gontar, director for sales at DTEK Krymenergo, said in the statement. The escalating crisis in eastern Ukraine and Russia’s annexation of Crimea last month led to the worst standoff against the U.S. […]

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Russian energy company Gazprom said Thursday it sent a bill to its Ukrainian partners for more than $11 billion for taking on less gas than contracted in 2013. Alexander Medvedev , deputy chief executive officer at Gazprom, said Ukrainian energy company Naftogaz took on 455 billion cubic feet of natural gas last year, but was contractually obligated to 1.4 trillion cubic feet. "Gazprom on Wednesday billed Naftogaz of Ukraine $11.38 billion for gas shortfall in 2013 under the take-or-pay contract," the Gazprom deputy said . Ukrainian Energy Minister Yuri Prodan said earlier this month the government may challenge a 2009 contract between Naftogaz and Ukraine to an international court of arbitration. Gazprom in 2009 cut gas supplies to Ukraine because of contractual disputes. The deal that ended the dispute saddled Ukraine with some of the highest gas bills in the region. European consumers get […]

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Ukrainian and Slovak officials Thursday said issues remain with a plan to give Ukraine a new delivery channel for natural gas from the European Union as the country seeks cheaper gas than that being offered by Russia. The officials said they would continue three-way talks Friday and into the weekend in the hope of signing on Monday a memorandum of understanding on the deal. Slovakia is offering Ukraine use of a secondary pipeline with annual capacity of 10 billion cubic meters. But reversing flows in the main Slovak pipeline to allow gas shipments to Ukraine creates legal issues between Slovakia and Russia’s OAO Gazprom , said European Commissioner for Energy Günther Oettinger. Ukraine’s Minister of Energy Yuriy Prodan said legal hurdles can be overcome by negotiations and he reiterated that Ukraine is seeking reverse flows in the main pipeline rather than in the smaller secondary pipeline. New Slovak […]

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Defying warnings from Moscow not to confront pro-Russian militants entrenched in towns across eastern Ukraine, the interim government on Friday threatened to maintain efforts to regain control by force that have so far produced little beyond Russian military drills on Ukraine’s border and heightened alarm about Moscow’s next move. In a posting on Facebook, Interior Minister Arsen Avakov of Ukraine declared on Friday that his country’s military operations in the east — known as “ATO,” meaning Anti-Terrorist Operation — had not been suspended. “There has been no suspension of the ATO in connection to the threat of invasion by Russia’s armed forces,” Mr. Avakov said. “The ATO goes on. The terrorists should be on their guard around the clock. Civilians have nothing to fear.” Despite the minister’s warning, there have been no reports of renewed conflict since Ukrainian forces moved briefly against pro-Russian positions on Thursday […]

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U.S. President Barack Obama said Russia hasn’t abided by either the spirit or the letter of an agreement to de-escalate tensions in Ukraine, and he warned that the U.S. is prepared to impose additional costs. "There will be further consequences, and we will ramp up further sanctions," he said during a news conference in Tokyo Thursday. The White House warned earlier this week that it would act if evidence of Russia’s compliance with an agreement reached in Geneva isn’t evident "in the coming days." Mr. Obama didn’t offer a more specific timeline Thursday, saying only that the timing was a matter of days, not weeks. The president said that the sanctions involve technical work that must be completed before the U.S. can move forward. "The fact that I haven’t announced them yet doesn’t mean that they haven’t been prepared and teed up," Mr. Obama said. The president also said […]

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President Barack Obama said the U.S. and its allies have additional sanctions against Russia ready to go as the crisis in Ukraine escalated, with security forces moving against pro-Russian separatists. Russia has yet to act in the spirit or the letter of an agreement reached in Geneva last week to defuse the confrontation, and if there’s no progress in the coming days, “we will follow through,” Obama said in Tokyo today. “We have been preparing for the prospect that we’re going to have to engage in further sanctions,” he told a news conference after meeting Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe. All that’s required is some “technical work” and coordination with allies, he said. Ukraine continued an offensive against separatists in eastern cities today, Russia warned yesterday it would protect its citizens in Ukrainian territory, raising the prospect of a military move. An accord to disarm rebels signed last week […]

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Ukraine considered resuming operations to oust militants from eastern cities as an agreement with Russia to reduce tensions in the region lay in tatters. Acting Ukrainian President Oleksandr Turchynov yesterday called on security forces to move against the separatists after the discovery of two bodies in the country’s eastern region, saying that “terrorists” backed by Russia had “crossed the line.” He spoke hours after meeting in Kiev with U.S. Vice President Joe Biden , who pledged American support including $50 million in aid. With the April 17 accord faltering, Ukraine is inching closer to a renewed push to dislodge militants in defiance of Russia’s warnings that such a move risks sparking civil war. The “active phase” of the offensive was suspended five days ago as Ukraine’s government pledged to abide by the deal negotiated in Geneva by Ukraine, the European Union, the U.S. and Russia. In a call yesterday […]

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A pro-Russian leader in the Crimean Peninsula of Ukraine said the region was receiving less than its fair share of natural gas.De facto Prime Minister of Crimea Sergei Aksyonov said about 30 percent of the area residents were getting supplied with natural gas. "And this is despite the fact that gas is produced on the peninsula on a scale sufficient to supply the whole population of the peninsula," he said Monday. Russia annexed the Ukrainian peninsula after political upheaval in Kiev moved the former Soviet republic closer to the European Union. Last month, Russian energy company Gazprom said it wanted to tap into the more than 50 billion cubic feet of gas available in Crimea. Gazprom says it’s owed billions of dollars from Kiev for unsettled natural gas bills. With Ukraine hosting the bulk of the Russian gas bound for Europe, Russian President Vladimir Putin warned the region’s energy […]

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