KIEV, January 18 (RIA Novosti) - Ukraine has increased its consumption of imported natural gas due to a cold spell, through a relevant agreement with Russian energy giant Gazprom, the country's fuel and energy minister said Wednesday.
"We have reduced natural gas exports to Europe by some 40 million cu m per day," Ivan Plachkov said.
He said Gazprom would compensate this from its own reserves.
"Ukraine has sufficient volumes of technological gas for the needs of [its] gas transportation system," the minister added.
Russia cut off natural gas supplies to the country for a few days in early January as a result of a long-running dispute with Ukraine, which ended in an interim agreement between the two countries. Under this agreement, Ukraine will buy natural gas at $95 per 1,000 cubic meters for the next six months.
