Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin (R) and his Ukrainian counterpart Yulia Tymoshenko meet for talks in Gdansk September 1, 2009.
Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin and his Ukrainian counterpart Yulia Tymoshenko held talks on Tuesday amid a new diplomatic row over a Russian Black Sea Fleet lighthouse.
During the meeting, the two leaders agreed that Ukraine will only pay for gas it actually consumes, rather than what it has ordered from Russia.
They also discussed the possibility to restore their joint aircraft projects that both sides have suspended funding.
GAS PROBLEMS ALMOST OVERCOME
The meeting occurred on Tuesday afternoon in the northern Polish city of Sopot, on the sidelines of activities marking the 70th anniversary of the start of the European wars in World War II.
After talks with Putin, Tymoshenko told reporters that Kiev and Moscow have almost overcome their differences over natural gas supplies, and Kiev will only pay for gas it actually consumes, rather than what it has ordered as stipulated in the gas contracts.
"In my view, we can already say that we have removed all of the gas problems," said the Ukrainian premier, as quoted by Russia's RIA Novosti news agency.
"It is very important that our next meeting will take place in October, as we have planned," she said as cited by the Itar-Tass news agency.
Tymoshenko and Putin are probably to meet at a meeting of the Russian-Ukrainian Intergovernmental Commission's Economic Cooperation Committee, which may take place in the northeastern Ukrainian city of Kharkov in October.
In response, Putin said: "We believe that current conditions of the world financial crisis, which affect national economies, must be taken into account in gas deliveries and settlements."
"We will order economic entities to bear the situation in mind," he said.
Tymoshenko said earlier that "Ukraine would get over energy dependence on Russia within 3-5 years," as her country plans to buy only 25 billion cubic meters of natural gas from Russia in 2010, instead of 33 billion cubic meters in 2009 and 52 billion cubic meters in 2008.
The Itar-Tass said Ukraine may try to revise the gas contracts signed with Russian energy giant Gazprom earlier this year with both Tymoshenko and Putin attending.
Russia cut off gas shipments to Ukraine in January over disputes on pricing and transition fees, leaving more than a dozen European nations without heating gas in the depths of winter for nearly two weeks.
Russia supplies a quarter of the EU's gas needs, with 80 percent of it pumped through Ukrainian pipelines.
