While the government in Kiev vowed to cut its energy reliance on Russia, Moscow-based Gazprom PJSC plans to deliver the equivalent of as much as 41 percent of Ukraine’s demand last year through 2018, according to its non-public budget approved in December. Ukraine stopped importing gas from Russia three months ago, saying it cost more than supplies from the European Union. While sales by Gazprom and its affiliates to Ukraine, a key part of transport infrastructure to the EU, have indeed fallen 90 percent over the past decade amid pricing disputes and a contracting economy, they were still worth $1.7 billion last year.
“A degree of skepticism is in order,” says Sijbren de Jong to Bloomberg Business. “Ukraine has come a long way in reducing its dependence on Russian gas imports, a very long way, but it is not totally independent of Russia.”
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