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Alexei Anishchuk News

14 Aug 2014

Putin Says Many European Leaders Want to End Sanctions Standoff

Vladimir Putin with Francois Hollande (Photo courtesy Putin's personal website)

Russian President Vladimir Putin on Thursday said he believed many European leaders were eager to end the standoff over sanctions with Russia. "I think that many in Europe including the politicians, my colleagues, ... (want) to get out as soon as possible of a situation, which is damaging our cooperation," Putin said during a visit to the Crimea peninsula, which Russia annexed from Ukraine earlier this year. He added that he had recently spoken to his French counterpart Francois Hollande and felt this also reflected the French president's mood.

08 Jun 2014

Russia, Ukraine, EU to resume gas talks on Monday

Moscow , Kiev and Brussels will restart Talks on Russian Gas Supplies on Monday to TRY to resolve a Dispute over price, a Russian Energy Ministry Official Said on Sunday. "The next (Round) of Trilateral Negotiations Tomorrow Evening will Take place in Brussels , "a spokeswoman for the Energy Ministry Said. Russia 's Energy minister Alexander Novak, his Ukrainian counterpart Yuri Prodan and the European Union 's Energy Commissioner Guenther Oettinger will Take Part in the Talks. Russia 's Gazprom and Ukraine State Energy Company Naftogaz met for Two days in Berlin Last week to TRY to Settle Dispute which could threaten the Gas flows to Europe . Ukraine and Russia Differ on How much Naftogaz has to Pay for the Gas.

02 Jun 2014

Russia, Ukraine Examine Gas Plan To Avoid Winter Supply Crisis

Russia and Ukraine agreed on Monday to examine a payment plan to settle Kiev's multi-billion gas debts and fix a price for supplies until June 2015, offering the promise of averting an energy crisis over the crucial winter period. The argument over prices for natural gas has added to tensions as the two countries have squared off over Moscow's seizure of Ukraine's Crimea peninsula and over a pro-Russian rebel uprising in eastern Ukraine. Russia's Gazprom had been threatening to cut off Ukraine's gas on Tuesday, with potential knock-on effects for the European Union because much of the gas it receives from Russia is pumped via Ukraine. But the immediate threat of a supply disruption was avoided after Kiev paid a first instalment, prompting Gazprom on Monday to grant it a week's grace.

25 May 2014

Rosneft, BP To Explore For Shale Oil In Russia

Rosneft and BP signed an agreement on Saturday to jointly explore for hard-to-recover oil in Russia, the first major deal for the state-run Russian oil company since the West imposed sanctions over Ukraine in March. Rosneft chief executive Igor Sechin, a close ally of President Vladimir Putin, has been targeted by U.S. sanctions along with some other members of Putin's so-called inner circle following Russia's annexation of Crimea from Ukraine in March. Western energy bosses saved the St Petersburg International Economic forum from a complete failure by effectively standing by Russia as heads of top banks and many other firms did not show up for fear of reprisals over the sanctions.

25 May 2014

No New Cold War Talks Over Ukraine

Russian President Vladimir Putin on Saturday dismissed talk of a new Cold War over the crisis in Ukraine and denied trying to rebuild the Soviet Union after reclaiming Crimea. In an interview with Reuters and other international news agencies in a grandiose palace outside St Petersburg, Putin blamed the violence and political instability in Ukraine on the West and warned that sanctions would rebound on the United States and the European Union. The crisis has plunged East-West relations to their lowest level since the Cold War ended in 1991. But making a new pledge to work with whoever is elected president in Ukraine on Sunday, Putin called for dialogue with the West and hoped the European Union and the United States were ready for compromise.

25 May 2014

Ukraine Has No Right For Gas Price Discount - Putin

Russian President Vladimir Putin on Saturday said that Ukraine had no right to demand cuts in the price it pays for natural gas supplies from Russia and said the price dispute should not be solved through dialogue and ultimatums . "We are ready for a constructive dialogue, but it should not be carried out though baseless demands and ultimatums, but rather on the basis of civilised market cooperation," Putin told a group of foreign journalists on the sidelines of the St Petersburg International Economic Forum . (Reporting by Reporting by Paul Ingrassia and Alexei Anishchuk; Writing by Vladimir Soldatkin)

29 Apr 2014

Putin Sees No Need To Sanction West, May Review Energy Ties

Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Tuesday that Moscow saw no need for counter sanctions against the West, but could reconsider the participation of Western companies in its economy, including energy projects. "We would very much wish not to resort to any measures in response. I hope we won't get to that point," he told reporters after meeting with the leaders of Belarus and Kazakhstan. The United States on Monday unveiled a new round of sanctions aimed at business leaders and companies close to Putin, while the European Union followed up on Tuesday by naming 15 Russians and Ukrainians to its blacklist, moving to freeze assets and deny visas.

22 Apr 2014

Putin Wants Beefed-up Presence in the Arctic

Photo: Rear Admiral Harley D. Nygren, NOAA Corps (ret.). Courtesy NOAA

Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Tuesday that Russia should step up its presence in the Arctic and challenge other nations in exploring the world's largest untapped natural reserves, days after it started shipping its first oil from the region. Russia's ambitions in the Arctic have for some time been raising eyebrows among other states vying for a presence there, but the Kremlin's annexation of Ukraine's Crimea Peninsula is likely to put its Arctic plans under greater scrutiny.

18 Apr 2014

Shell Commited To Russia Expansion Despite Sanctions

Meeting with Shell CEO Ben van Beurden. (Photo: The Presidential Press and Information Office)

Royal Dutch Shell is committed to expansion in Russia, Chief Executive Ben van Beurden told Russian President Vladimir Putin at a meeting on Friday amid sanctions imposed on the country after its annexation of Ukraine's Crimea region. Shell plans to expand Russia's only liquefied natural gas (LNG) plant with Russian partner Gazprom, he said at a meeting at Putin's residence. "We, of course, will pledge all the necessary administrative guidance and support," Putin said in response in a meeting that was later broadcast on national television.

18 Apr 2014

Russia Ships First Oil From Offshore Arctic Platform

(Image: http://media.gazprom-neft.com)

President Vladimir Putin hailed Russia's first shipment of Arctic offshore oil on Friday, saying the platform decried by environmentalists will help Moscow expand its global energy markets share. Gazprom Neft, the oil arm of Russia's top gas producer Gazprom, shipped the first 70,000 tonnes of oil by tanker from the Prirazlomnoye platform, the site of a protest by 30 Greenpeace activists who were arrested last year. The launch of oil production in the Arctic, seen by Russia as one of the key sources in the gradual replacement of output from its depleted West Siberian fields…

16 Apr 2014

Putin set on defusing Ukraine crisis

Foreign ministers from East and West will try to defuse the Ukraine crisis on Thursday in Geneva, once frequently the scene of Cold War negotiations, but will risk being upstaged by Russian President Vladimir Putin. With Russian troops massed on the border with Ukraine, prospects of significant progress at the four-way talks appear slim. By contrast, what Putin says during his annual "hotline" session with the Russian people may have far greater influence on events in Ukraine's rebellious east. Thursday's talks will bring the ministers of Russia, Ukraine and the United Statestogether with the European Union's foreign policy chief to discuss a crisis in which Kiev is struggling to reassert its authority in eastern towns largely controlled by armed pro-Russian separatists.

15 Apr 2014

Ukraine launches restricted operation

Ukrainian forces launched a "special operation" on Tuesday against separatist militia in the Russian-speaking East, authorities said, although aside from a landing by airborne troops the action was limited. Soldiers disembarked from two helicopters at an airfield at Kramatorsk, where reporters earlier heard gunfire that seemed to prevent an air force plane from landing. The troops withdrew into barracks after local civilians manning a barricade gave them a hostile reception when they tried to leave the compound. In Kiev, acting President Oleksander Turchinov declared a much-needed victory over pro-Russian rebels by saying the air base had been "liberated." But there was no sign of militants.

12 Apr 2014

"Gas War" looms as Pro-Russian militants raise flags in East Ukraine

Pro-Russian militants raised their flags over official buildings in two eastern Ukrainian cities on Saturday, deepening a stand-off with Moscow which, Kiev warned, was dragging Europe closer to a "gas war" that could disrupt supplies across the continent. At least 20 men armed with pistols and rifles took over the police station and a security services headquarters in Slaviansk, about 150 km (90 miles) from the border with Russia. Officials said the men had seized hundreds of pistols from arsenals in the buildings. The militants replaced the Ukrainian flag on one of the buildings with the red, white and blue Russian flag. Some local residents helped the militants build barricades out of tyres in anticipation that police would try to force them out, a Reuters photographer at the scene said.