CIAO DATE: 09/2009
January 2009
Centre for European Policy Studies
The January 2009 interruptions of gas supplies from Russia to the EU via Ukraine, following the earlier 2006 crisis, has confirmed the absolutely intolerable situation in which a commodity of strategic importance for European industry and households has become uncertain and erratic, in breach of long-term supply contracts, as a result of disorderly commercial and political relations between Russia and Ukraine. The recently agreed tri-partite (EU, Russia, Ukraine) monitoring system is a positive step, even if at the time of writing supplies have not yet resumed. But in any case this can be viewed as no more than a stop-gap measure. A more fundamental and permanent solution is required. For this purpose the authors propose that the EU, Russia and Ukraine negotiate the creation of a new business consortium to be granted a long-term concession to operate the Ukraine trunk gas transit pipeline.
Resource link: The Case for a Gas Transit Consortium in Ukraine: A Cost-Benefit Analysis [PDF] - 282K