A Russian-Ukrainian deal to restore Russian gas supplies via Ukraine to Europe appeared on the verge of collapse on Sunday after Moscow rejected hand written additions by Kiev as a 'mockery of common sense'.
A Russian government source said Prime Minister Vladimir Putin had proposed sending officials to the EU in Brussels on Monday to discuss the deadlock, that has choked off much of Europe's gas supply at the height of a bitter winter.
Ukraine, its own supplies cut off in a dispute with Moscow over the price it pays for Russian gas, signed an agreement on Sunday allowing monitors to oversee transit gas piping to Europe and ensure Kiev did not siphon off supplies for its own use.
The European Union was also party to the deal and EU monitors had already begun arriving when the new dispute flared. "I cannot call such stipulations and additions other than a mockery of common sense and violation of earlier achieved agreements," Russian President Dmitry Medvedev said.
"These actions, in fact, aim to disrupt the existing agreements on monitoring gas transit and are clearly provocative and destructive in essence ... I therefore order the government not to implement the document signed yesterday."
BROADER TENSIONS:
The gas dispute has played out against a background of broader tensions between Ukraine, seeking to join the Nato alliance, and its former Soviet master in Moscow. Putin has accused the Ukrainian leadership of being corrupt and inept. A scanned copy of the monitoring agreement, seen by Reuters, has the hand-written words "with declaration attached" next to the signature of the Ukrainian government's representative.
The declaration, a copy of which has also been seen by Reuters, states Ukraine had not siphoned off transit gas and that it has no outstanding debts to Gazprom - a central bone of contention between the two countries.
It said Russia must supply extra "technical" gas to the Ukraine to maintain pressure in the pipeline system - a demand which the Russian side would reject without a pricing pact. The EU had no immediate comment on the development, but the Commission had said earlier that an attached Ukrainian declaration did not affect the substance of the agreement.