MILAN, (Reuters) – Russia and Ukraine made progress yesterday towards resolving a dispute over gas supplies in time for winter, but European leaders said Moscow still had to do much more to prop up a fragile ceasefire and end fighting in eastern Ukraine.
The mooted deal could re-open Russian gas to Ukraine cut off since June, and ensure supply to European buyers further west before demand surges in the cold months and stocks run down. It came as something of a surprise after talks in Milan that the Kremlin said were “full of misunderstandings and disagreements”.
Russia’s Vladimir Putin told reporters that a deal ensuring gas supplies “at least for the winter” had been reached after a final one-on-one meeting with Ukraine’s Petro Poroshenko, which followed talks attended by European leaders.
“We agreed on all the parameters of this deal,” Putin said, but he urged European countries to help Ukraine meet a debt for gas, which he said stood at $4.5 billion.
The agreement followed a hectic series of meetings on the margins of a summit between Asian and European leaders in Milan at which Europeans showed no signs of agreeing to lift sanctions against Moscow imposed over the Ukraine crisis.
There was some progress on the issue of monitoring the Ukraine-Russian border and the so-called demarcation line separating pro-Russia militias and Ukrainian forces. Italy, Ukraine and Russia agreed to join France and Germany in providing surveillance drones for the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, which is overseeing a ceasefire.
However an overall solution to a crisis which has revived memories of the Cold War still appeared remote, with key issues open including the question of local elections in breakaway regions of eastern Ukraine. And the meetings demonstrated the bitterness of relations between Putin and European leaders, above all Germany’s Chancellor Angela Merkel.
“I cannot see a breakthrough here at all so far,” said Merkel after one meeting. “We will continue to talk. There was progress on some details, but the main issue is continued violations of the territorial integrity of Ukraine.”
Kiev and its Western backers accuse Moscow of aiding a separatist revolt in Ukraine by providing troops and arms. Russia denies direct involvement but says it has a right to defend the interests of Russian speakers.
Fighting has largely died down under a ceasefire agreed last month, but Western countries say Moscow must take further steps to reassure Kiev if it wants sanctions to be lifted.
