DPR and LPR are preparing to receive gas from Russia
Moscow - Kyiv, September 29 (PolitNavigator, Mikhail Stamm) - The leadership of the self-proclaimed Lugansk People's Republic is looking for opportunities to switch the region's gas distribution network to gas supplies from Russia, Andrei Lysenko, speaker of the National Security and Defense Council of Ukraine, said yesterday. If this happens, the northern regions of the region, which are under the control of the Ukrainian authorities, will be cut off from gas.
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Three branches of gas pipelines running from Russian territory to Ukraine pass through the buffer zone. Gas pipelines in the buffer zone belong to Donetskoblgaz (part of Ukrtransgaz), Donetskgorgaz and Luganskgaz (belonging to the structures of Dmitry Firtash). All of them are intact and are still integrated into the Ukrainian gas transportation system. From the beginning of the heating season, they will be able to take gas from Ukrainian underground storage facilities (UGS), if the infrastructure is not destroyed by then. Technically, Kyiv can cut off the gas supply if, for example, consumers refuse to pay for gas. There is an underground gas storage facility located near the buffer zone near Lugansk, but Kommersant was unable to find out who really controls it.
At the end of last week, LPR Deputy Prime Minister Valery Potapov actually stated that it has agreements with Russia on gas purchases if Kyiv stops supplying it to the territories occupied by militias. According to Mr. Potapov, the corresponding negotiations were held on September 25 in Moscow by the leader of the self-proclaimed republic, Igor Plotnitsky. True, immediately after this, the press secretary of the head of Gazprom, Sergei Kupriyanov, said that the monopoly was not aware of these agreements. All Kommersant’s interlocutors admit that physically the DPR and LPR can receive gas from Russia, and there are not even legal obstacles to this, since gas imports in Ukraine are demonopolized. But Moscow stubbornly denies the fact of such negotiations.
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