Both Russia and Europe are anxious to strike a new energy deal as the current Russian-EU partnership agreement expires at the end of the year.
Photo: Alexander Miridonov
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Europe Offers Russia a New Energy Deal
EU foreign ministers are to launch official bargaining for new energy agreements with Russia on Monday. The EU is ready to meet Russia halfway but also plans to expand the Energy Community Treaty onto the countries which transit Russian fuel.
EU foreign ministers are meeting in Brussels on Monday to discuss a set of moves and documents for energy agreements with Russia which are to be signed within the next six months.
The current Russia-EU partnership agreement expires at the end of the year. The European Commission has announced that the document is going to be substituted by a new partnership agreement and a Russia-EU energy treaty. Russia and Europe are wrangling over the agreement’s key issues. The EU has been insisting that Moscow ratify the EU Energy Charter that Russia dismisses as unprofitable.
Well-placed sources of Kommersant report that references to the Energy Charter are likely to be deleted from the EU-Russia energy treaty as a concession to Moscow. As compensation, Brussels is going to integrate in its energy strategy Russia’s transit partners. The EU hopes to expand the Energy Community Treaty to include Russia’s neighbors Ukraine, Moldova and Turkey. The countries may be offered to sign a joint energy agreement which will probably contain key points of the EU Energy Charter. As a long-term plan, the Europeans also hope to carry out the same policy with Belarus, North African countries and the Middle East.
The Russian foreign office is in talks with the EU on energy issues but it is still ready to react to the “encirclement of Russia” by the Energy Treaty with encircling the EU. Russian Energy Minister Viktor Khristenko made a blunt statement on Friday in Algeria staying the two countries plan to create “a gas OPEC”, evidently, to counterbalance the Energy Community Treaty.
www.kommersant.com
All the Article in Russian as of Jan. 22, 2007
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