Gazprom raise the bill forUkraine. The Russian energy giant has put an end to the policy of discounts on methane gas sold to Kiev, increasing the price by more than a third, up to 385,5 dollars per thousand cubic meters. The discount from about $400 to $268,5 was agreed in December, before President Yanukovych was ousted in Ukraine and Russia seized Crimea.
"In accordance with the contract in force on the delivery of gas - announced the owner of Gazprom, Alexei Miller -, the price for Ukraine in the second quarter will be 385,5 dollars".
According to the number one of the Moscow giant, in response to the increase in the price of Russian methane, Kiev has raised the tariffs for the transit of gas on its territory by 10%, which since January were 2,73 dollars per thousand cubic meters per hundred kilometres.
Miller specified that Ukraine's debt to Gazprom for gas bills amounts to $1,7 billion and that the cancellation of the discount is linked precisely to the non-payments of supplies in 2013.
The discount granted by Moscow was interpreted by many analysts as a sort of reward to the Ukrainian government for not having signed an association agreement with the European Union at the end of November. That same decision had triggered street protests which then unleashed three months of violence until the deposition of Yanukovych and the crisis in Crimea.
