GAZPROM AND EU SIGN PROTOCOL
On October 18 Russia’s Gazprom, France’s Gas de France, Germany’s Ruhrgas and Winterschal, and Italy’s Eni signed a protocol in Moscow, concerning a natural gas pipeline circumventing Ukraine. Leonid Kuchma is quoted by Interfax Ukraine as saying that there is usually quite some time before such a protocol is implemented. “How much time is has taken to discuss the pipeline from the Caspian Sea to the Turkish port of Ceyhan. And where is this pipeline?” The Ukrainian President believes the gas pipeline traversing Ukraine can secure full deliveries to Europe and can increase its performance by another 30%.
Rem Viakhirev, head of Russia’s Gazprom, currently in de facto charge of the gas sector in President Putin’s Administration, has long championed a gas pipeline bypassing Ukraine. It is a project the European Union is obviously interested in, because it would allow its member states to reduce their dependence on unstable OPEC supplies, and it is ready to pay. The projected pipeline, going through Belarus, Poland, and the Slovak Republic, will run 600 kilometers at $2 billion design cost. By using it, Russia will pump 60 billion cu. meters of gas to Western Europe in addition to its current 125 billion cu. m. In any case, this is what Gazprom’s Press Secretary Dmitry Dankin told Interfax Ukraine, adding that the feasibility study is ready and that the bypass project will be ready two years from now, although Polish and Slovak official consent will be required, of course.
The Russian newspaper Segodnia claims that Warsaw and Bratislava have already agreed in principle to the construction of what is described as “an anti-Ukrainian pipeline branch.” And the European Union made clear its approval even earlier. Russia accuses Ukraine of unauthorized gas pilferage from the pipeline. Gazprom says that this amounts to 15 billion cu. meters this year. Russia no longer believes Kyiv will be able to correct the situation.
Warsaw and Bratislava offer no comment on Gazprom’s accusation. Polish spokesman Krzysztof Luft told Warsaw’s Gazeta Wyborcza that no consultations concerning the creation of such a concern had taken place with the Polish government, while Polish Economy Minister Janusz Steinhoff claims he learned about the project from the press. “We would prefer to see Poland treated as an equal partner and candidate EU member,” he complained in an interview with the magazine Wprost. Rzeczpospolita notes that the EU is indeed determined to solve its problems without any regard for Ukraine’s political interests or those of Poland, the latter being the EU’s strategic partner, and that the bitter lesson to be learned from all this is that Poland has failed to assert its stand. On the contrary, Poland is trying to make the best of the situation, meaning that the longer the distance of the gas pipeline, the better. Slovakia’s ranking officials seem to be thinking in a similar vein. The longer the distance, the more a given country will get in terms of transit charges. In other words, despite political declarations supporting Ukraine, it appears that the governments of these countries will not refuse the tasty morsel being offered. This would be additional evidence that economic interests seem more important than those of strategic partnership.
