While the countries in the European Union are imposing gas rationing, Ukrainian Prime Minister Denis Shmigal said on Tuesday that Ukraine will ask the United States for free natural gas deliveries on the same principle that is applied to weapons and ammunition.
Shmigal said in a video posted to his Telegram channel that Kyiv will need the so-called gas lend-lease for a stable heating season during the coming winter they expect to be the most difficult winter in Ukrainian history.
The government of Ukraine, as he noted, is looking for all possible tools to be ready for any scenario, suggesting that Kyiv expects to get deliveries of the American LNG for free without elaborating on how the proposed “lend-lease” arrangement would work.
Shmigal’s proposal comes in the wake of the Ukrainian state-owned gas company Naftogaz’s default on its bonds after which it requested the government to take full responsibility for raising the funds needed to import the gas needed for the upcoming heating season.
However, according to former Ukrainian prime minister Yulia Timoshenko’s accusations on Monday, Naftogaz is engaging in the scam of the century by asking for billions to buy gas when Ukraine doesn’t need it and may even be running a surplus.
After heading the US-backed cabinet from 2007-2010, Timoshenko now sits in the parliament as the head of the ‘Fatherland’ party.
She claims that Naftogaz is running a massive embezzlement scheme, demanding additional funding for gas purchases ahead of the winter including “compensation” from the budget to purchase an additional six billion cubic meters of natural gas abroad.
Kyiv lawmakers are about to pass several bills that would grant Naftogaz the requested funds with the government planning to use the international financial aid Western nations provided to Ukraine for that “compensation.”
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