Ukraine boasts tackling energy crisis

The crisis committee at the Ministry of Energy and Coal Industry of Ukraine says the energy crisis prevention action plan has been fulfilled as of March 7.

The latest emergency situation was triggered by Russia's Gazprom as it suddenly refused to supply gas to Ukraine in March, reducing the contractual gas pressure at the entry point to Ukraine's gas transmission system.

"The crisis committee at the Energy Ministry has decided to announce the completion of the crisis situation as of March 7, 2018," Ukrainian energy and coal industry minister's advisor Maksym Beliavsky wrote on Facebook on March 6.

Read alsoUkraine steps up security measures at GTS sites amid conflict with GazpromAs UNIAN reported earlier, after Gazprom lost a gas dispute with Naftogaz at the Stockholm Arbitration, being obliged to pay the Ukrainian company $2.56 billion, the Russian company first agreed to deliver in March to Ukraine 500 million cubic meters of gas at prices determined by court, but then (on March 1, 15 minutes before the expected start of supply) suddenly refused to fulfill its contractual obligations and lowered to a critical level the pressure at the entrance to the Ukrainian GTS on the country's eastern border.

Naftogaz called such actions by Gazprom a failure to fulfill the court's award and blamed the Russian company for gas shortage in Ukraine's GTS.

Read alsoUkraine's Naftogaz may sue Gazprom, againTo overcome the crisis, the Cabinet of Ministers on March 2 introduced a five-day national action plan to prevent a crisis in the energy sector, which provided for a restriction on gas consumption within the country, while Naftogaz made an emergency purchase of 60 million cubic meters from the Polish company PGNiG.

According to Poroshenko, thanks to the efforts by Naftogaz and the Cabinet of Ministers, the country will complete the heating period without any emergencies. He also stressed that Gazprom would pay "every single penny" under the Stockholm Arbitration's award.

Poroshenko assured that the situation with gas supplies had stabilized as of March 3. This confirms that Ukraine is a reliable transit country for Russian gas.