Turkmenistan: Ukraine Paying Debt

ASHGABAT, Turkmenistan (AP) – Ukraine has begun to pay off its debt to Turkmenistan for past natural gas supplies after weeks of denying that it owed anything and accusing the Central Asian nation of failed deliveries, the Turkmen Foreign Ministry said Sunday.

The ministry said in a statement that Ukraine had paid US$60 million (euro50 million) of its US$160 million (euro134 million) debt to Turkmenistan. Ukraine will pay another installment of about US$30 million (euro25 million) in cash, and the rest of the debt will be covered with goods supplies, the ministry said.

Ukraine insisted earlier that it had no debts and that Turkmenistan actually owed it money because Kiev had paid for gas it had not received. It said Turkmenistan had failed to make deliveries under a deal on gas supplies in 2006.

Turkmenistan said Ukraine owed money for the gas delivered in 2005.

AP