Rusland en Oekraïne maakten dit weekend een einde aan hun gasruzie. Volgens de nieuwe overeenkomst krijgt Oekraïne dit jaar een korting van 20 procent op de gasprijs die andere Europese landen betalen. In ruil daarvoor moet het de tarieven voor de doorvoer van gas naar de rest van Europa op hetzelfde niveau houden als in 2008.
Ongeveer 80% van het Russische gas, 120 miljard kubieke meters per jaar, wordt geëxporteerd naar Europa. Alternatieve routes door Polen en de Blauwe Stroom-pijplijn via Turkije kunnen slechts 50 miljard kubieke meters per jaar aan. De Nordstream pijplijn naar Duitsland via de Baltische Zee wordt pas in 2011 voltooid en zal slechts 16 miljard kubieke meters per jaar kunnen vervoeren.
Oekraïne heeft zich in 1991 onafhankelijk van Rusland verklaard, maar heeft tot op de dag van vandaag nog nooit de ‘Europese gasprijs’ moeten betalen. De gasruzie van de laatste weken lijkt meer en meer op een post-Soviet conflict over identiteit, territorium en macht. Andreas Umland geeft in zijn artikel ‘Is the EU becoming an instrument of Moscow’s neo-colonialism?’ een overzicht van de relaties tussen Oekraïne en Rusland.
Ongeveer 80% van het Russische gas, 120 miljard kubieke meters per jaar, wordt geëxporteerd naar Europa. Alternatieve routes door Polen en de Blauwe Stroom-pijplijn via Turkije kunnen slechts 50 miljard kubieke meters per jaar aan. De Nordstream pijplijn naar Duitsland via de Baltische Zee wordt pas in 2011 voltooid en zal slechts 16 miljard kubieke meters per jaar kunnen vervoeren.
Oekraïne heeft zich in 1991 onafhankelijk van Rusland verklaard, maar heeft tot op de dag van vandaag nog nooit de ‘Europese gasprijs’ moeten betalen. De gasruzie van de laatste weken lijkt meer en meer op een post-Soviet conflict over identiteit, territorium en macht. Andreas Umland geeft in zijn artikel ‘Is the EU becoming an instrument of Moscow’s neo-colonialism?’ een overzicht van de relaties tussen Oekraïne en Rusland.
At no time before the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 has Ukraine been an independent state. During most of its history, much or all of Ukrainian territory was controlled from Moscow – whether by the Tsars or the Communist Party of the Soviet Union secretaries. Kiev is the cradle of all three of the Eastern Slavic nations: Ukrainians, Belarusians and Great Russians. As many of the latter perceive Ukraine as a part of Russia and the West as anti-Russian, they observe Ukrainian-Western rapprochement with suspicion, if not hostility. Russian elites see Ukraine as lying within their legitimate sphere of interests, and deny Kiev full sovereignty. The Ukrainian elites seek sustainable independence above all from Russia, and a way for Ukraine into the European Union.
De laatste jaren zijn Rusland en Oekraïne meer en meer afhankelijk van elkaar geworden.
Whereas Ukraine is dependent on Russian gas and oil, Russia depends on Ukraine’s cooperation in the transportation of its energy resources to its major clients in the EU. This created a healthy balance in Russian-Ukrainian relations. For instance, Moscow might have been interested in using its influence among the population of Crimea to broach the issue of the peninsula’s separation from Ukraine, following the model of Russian support for separatism in the Georgian provinces of Abkhazia and South Ossetia. But until recently, Kiev would have retaliated against any such attempts by way of threatening to suspend gas deliveries from Russia to the West.
Door het arriveren van EU waarnemers, wordt die wederzijdse afhankelijkheid afgezwakt.
Hoe het ook zij, beide partijen komen gehavend uit het conflict en beiden hebben de belangen van de Europese Unie naast zich neer gelegd. Vooral Oekraïne heeft zich nogmaals ontpopt als een onbetrouwbare handelspartner en geen geschikte kandidaat om toe te treden tot de Europese Unie of NATO. Opmerkelijk vond ik de perceptie van Oekraïne in het westen. Waar tijdens de gascrisis van 2006 Oekraïne gezien werd als de ‘moedige natie die geterroriseerd wordt door de grote Russische beer’ was dit ditmaal anders. Misschien betekent dit wel een verandering in de (overwegend negatieve) berichtgeving over Rusland?
Het conflict
Vladimir Frolov geeft in ‘The pipe is blocked in Kiev’ een overzicht van het gasconflict:
On October 2008, Ukraine’s Prime Minister Yulia Timoshenko had a nice fire-side chat with Putin at his dacha near Moscow. During the conversation the two reached a strategic deal that envisioned a comfortable gas price for Ukraine for 2009 and beyond (we now can surmise that the offer was around a reasonable $250 per cubic meter) in exchange for Gazprom’s acquisition of a 50% stake in the Ukrainian gas transportation system (along the lines of a similar agreement with Belarus) and Gazprom’s right to directly supply gas to (and collect payments from) Ukrainian customers.
Timoshenko, for her part sought to cut out the middleman – Rosukrenergo (RUE), an international trading company registered in the Swiss canton of Zug, half-owned directly by Gazprom and half owned by a group of shadowy Ukrainian businessmen led by Dmitro Firtash. Timoshenko got Moscow to agree that all future gas contracts will be signed directly between Gazprom and Naftogaz (controlled by Timoshenko’s allies), thus eliminating Rosukrenergo and costing Firtash billions of dollars.
Firtash, however, is a major sponsor of the Party of Regions, led by Viktor Yanukovich. Ukrainian media reports also have alleged that Firtash has been providing black cash payments to President Viktor Yushchenko’s political campaigns and allegedly has Yushchenko’s Secretariat on his payroll. There have also been rumors in Kiev that some of Yushchenko’s closest relatives might have been beneficiaries in RUE.
Firtash is a direct opponent and business rival of Yulia Timoshenko and her team as he and his allies in Yushchenko’s closest circle stand to lose their lucrative business. Firtash is rumored to have helped scuttle the deal between Timoshenko and Yanukovich in December 2008 to form a constitutional majority coalition in the Rada that would have adopted the constitutional reform to abolish the popular vote for the President and make him elected by Parliament. Such a scenario would have been a complete disaster for Yushchenko and his cronies.
President Yushchenko and his situational ally Viktor Yanukovich hated to see Prime Minister Yulia Timoshenko reach a gas deal with Moscow at a reasonably good price of $250. This would have strengthened Timoshenko politically and would make her bid for the Presidency in 2010 a lot easier. Neither Yushchenko nor Yanukovich wanted that to happen, so they rushed to block Timoshenko’s efforts to repay Ukrainian debts to Gazprom for 2008 (valued at over $2 billion) and thus scuttled the deal.
Het conflict
Vladimir Frolov geeft in ‘The pipe is blocked in Kiev’ een overzicht van het gasconflict:
On October 2008, Ukraine’s Prime Minister Yulia Timoshenko had a nice fire-side chat with Putin at his dacha near Moscow. During the conversation the two reached a strategic deal that envisioned a comfortable gas price for Ukraine for 2009 and beyond (we now can surmise that the offer was around a reasonable $250 per cubic meter) in exchange for Gazprom’s acquisition of a 50% stake in the Ukrainian gas transportation system (along the lines of a similar agreement with Belarus) and Gazprom’s right to directly supply gas to (and collect payments from) Ukrainian customers.
Timoshenko, for her part sought to cut out the middleman – Rosukrenergo (RUE), an international trading company registered in the Swiss canton of Zug, half-owned directly by Gazprom and half owned by a group of shadowy Ukrainian businessmen led by Dmitro Firtash. Timoshenko got Moscow to agree that all future gas contracts will be signed directly between Gazprom and Naftogaz (controlled by Timoshenko’s allies), thus eliminating Rosukrenergo and costing Firtash billions of dollars.
Firtash, however, is a major sponsor of the Party of Regions, led by Viktor Yanukovich. Ukrainian media reports also have alleged that Firtash has been providing black cash payments to President Viktor Yushchenko’s political campaigns and allegedly has Yushchenko’s Secretariat on his payroll. There have also been rumors in Kiev that some of Yushchenko’s closest relatives might have been beneficiaries in RUE.
Firtash is a direct opponent and business rival of Yulia Timoshenko and her team as he and his allies in Yushchenko’s closest circle stand to lose their lucrative business. Firtash is rumored to have helped scuttle the deal between Timoshenko and Yanukovich in December 2008 to form a constitutional majority coalition in the Rada that would have adopted the constitutional reform to abolish the popular vote for the President and make him elected by Parliament. Such a scenario would have been a complete disaster for Yushchenko and his cronies.
President Yushchenko and his situational ally Viktor Yanukovich hated to see Prime Minister Yulia Timoshenko reach a gas deal with Moscow at a reasonably good price of $250. This would have strengthened Timoshenko politically and would make her bid for the Presidency in 2010 a lot easier. Neither Yushchenko nor Yanukovich wanted that to happen, so they rushed to block Timoshenko’s efforts to repay Ukrainian debts to Gazprom for 2008 (valued at over $2 billion) and thus scuttled the deal.
Bron: www.russiaprofile.org
Zie ook: http://russland.ru/gasstreit/index.php
Geen opmerkingen:
Een reactie posten