MOSCOW, November 5. /TASS/. The European Union is ready to allocate money for Ukraine’s gas debt repayment, EU Ambassador to Russia Vigaudas Ushatskas said on Wednesday.
“The European Union allocates unprecedented volumes of aid to Ukraine, which amount to €11 billion,” Ushatskas said in an interview with Ekho Moskvy radio station.
“We helped Russia and Ukraine reach agreement on the entire range of complex gas issues and sums will be coming both from the EU and the IMF (International Monetary Fund) for Ukraine’s gas debt repayment,” he said.
Ukraine’s friends should be interested in the country’s transformation into a sovereign and economically independent state, the EU ambassador said.
Ukraine needs to implement internal economic, political and social reforms to achieve this goal, the EU ambassador to Russia said.
Russia and Ukraine agreed at their consultations with the EU’s mediation in Brussels on October 31 on the resumption of Russian natural gas supplies for Ukrainian consumers, their guaranteed transit to Europe across Ukraine and Kiev’s partial gas debt repayment.
Ukraine has to repay $3.1 billion for the supplied Russian natural gas until the end of this year. Gazprom confirmed on Wednesday it had received the first tranche of $1.45 billion as Kiev’s debt repayment. Ukraine has to pay the remaining $1.65 billion to Gazprom until December 31, 2014. The repayment of the first and second debt tranches are “a prerequisite for Russian natural gas supplies after December 31, 2014."