Gazprom CEO Alexei Miller said his company had reopened the pipelines to Ukraine after receiving a prepayment of $234 million (205.3 million euros) for the month of October, out of an expected $500 million.
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In June, Ukraine had announced it was suspending all purchases of natural gas from Russian Federation after EU-mediated talks aimed at resolving a price dispute broke down.
Sefcovic declined to put a figure on the price Gazprom is charging Ukrainian utility Naftogaz under the new winter package but said it was in line with that being paid by Poland – a price which is also undisclosed.
However, economist and political scientist Alexander Dudchak believes that it is premature to claim that all the problems with Russian gas supplies to Ukraine have been resolved.
“This is a resumption of cooperation”, Yury Korolchuk, an analyst with the Institute of Energy Strategies in Kiev, told AFP.
As the nations fall out over the conflict in Syria, Moscow-based Gazprom PJSC, the world’s largest gas producer, said last week it would cut the capacity of a planned link to Turkey and on to Europe by 50 percent.
“In 20 to 30 days, the gas volumes in the storage facilities will be significantly increased. This is a huge risk”, he added.
Gazprom has already tested a new pricing mechanism, by selling just over 1 billion cubic metres (bcm) of gas through a tender – its first ever – in the former imperial capital St Petersburg last month.
But these reserves could not be enough if the winter is harsh, they warned.
Moscow hiked the price it charges Ukraine following the ouster of Yanukovych – an event that unleashed a pro-Russian insurgency in the east of the ex-Soviet country.
Russia’s energy minister said 10 days ago the discounted price paid by Kiev in the fourth quarter would be roughly $227-$233 per thousand cubic meters.
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The Trans-Anatolian Natural Gas Pipeline (TANAP), from the Georgia-Turkey border to the Turkey-Greece border, officially started construction in March 2015, and the Trans Adriatic Pipeline (TAP), from the Turkey-Greece border to Italy, plans to start construction in 2016.
