Globe and Mail: Ukraine’s new president faces looming energy crisis

Russia and Ukraine are headed toward another showdown, this time over Kiev’s unpaid gas bills, in a dispute that could disrupt natural gas deliveries to Europe.

Petro Poroshenko, who was elected Ukraine’s new president on Sunday, will immediately face a looming energy crisis. The economically battered country has no financial resources to pay for Russian gas, while its supplier, Moscow’s OAO Gazprom, has threatening to stop selling fuel to its neighbour by June 3.

Gazprom is eager to maintain service to its customers throughout the rest of Europe, but worries Ukraine will siphon gas destined for other customers as it moves through the transit pipelines, said Tatiana Mitrovic, head of the oil and gas sector at the Energy Research Institute of the Russian Academy of Science.
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