Russia cut off gas supplies last week after they accused Ukraine of stealing gas being shipped across their country to more than a dozen European countries. Gazprom cut Ukraine off after the country failed to pay a $2 billion debt owed to the company for gas supplied to Ukraine. Under the agreement, European Union and Russian monitors will be stationed where the pipelines enter and exit Ukraine and will compare the amount of gas going in and out of the country – a drop in the amount going out would indicate Ukraine was siphoning some off.
But Ukraine nearly sank the agreement at the last minute by inserting a hand-written declaration saying that Ukraine hadn’t stolen any gas and that they didn’t owe Gazprom any outstanding debt. Russian President Dmitry Medvedev said Ukraine was making “a mockery” of the negotiations by unilaterally inserting conditions at the last minute and said Russia would not resume shipments. Ukraine then withdrew their declaration after European officials said that it was not valid.
The gas shortage has hit countries in the Balkan and Central regions of Europe hard, causing crippling drops of heating and power supplies in some countries. It’s prompted Slovakia to begin the process of restarting a closed nuclear power plant, a move that is angering their neighbor, Austria, who don’t consider the site safe. The Bohunice plant is a Soviet-era nuclear reactor, that was finally shut down last year. Slovakia’s neighbors were so concerned about Bohunice, that its shut down was one of the conditions Slovakia had to meet to join the European Union. Bulgaria is also talking about firing up two Soviet-era reactors it shut down in 2006 in order to join the EU as well because of critical energy shortages caused by the gas crisis.
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