Russia subsidized Ukraine for four years - Putin's letter to European leaders
MOSCOW. April 10 (Interfax) - Russian President Vladimir Putin said Russia provided considerable financial resources for subsidizing the Ukrainian economy in the past few years.
"During the past four years Russia has been subsidizing Ukraine's economy by offering slashed natural gas prices worth 35.4 billion US dollars. In addition, in December 2013, Russia granted Ukraine a loan of 3 billion US dollars," Putin said in his letter to the leaders of the European countries receiving Russian gas through Ukraine.
The document contains a list of discounts for gas that Russia granted Ukraine.
"Beginning with 2009, the sum total of these discounts stands at 17 billion US dollars. To this, we should add another 18.4 billion US dollars incurred by the Ukrainian side as a minimal take-or-pay fine," the letter says.
"These very significant sums were directed towards maintaining stability and creditability of the Ukrainian economy and preservation of jobs. No other country provided such support except Russia," the letter says.
Putin's letter was sent to the leaders of Moldova, Romania, Turkey, Hungary, Slovakia, Slovenia, Macedonia, the Czech Republic, France, Germany, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Serbia, Bulgaria, Austria, and Italy.
