Pat Dollard | Young Americans

Ukranian President Viktor Yuschenko, before and after being poisoned by Vladimir Putin for freeing his country from Russian control.

Ukraine’s prime minister and European officials traveled to Moscow on Saturday for talks aimed at restoring Russian natural gas supplies to Europe after a damaging 11-day halt in deliveries piped across Ukraine.

The gas cutoff has deepened Europe’s winter chill, leaving homes without heat and forcing factories to shut. EU nations have criticized both Russia and Ukraine for allowing their politically charged price dispute to affect deliveries, saying the ex-Soviet republics are holding Europe hostage.

Ukraine’s pipeline network normally carries about 80 percent of the Russian gas that goes to Europe.

“The main task now is to restore the movement of Russian gas to Europe,” Ukrainian Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko said before leaving Kiev. “Ukraine needs this most of all, because our image as a transit state is damaged.”

But with each side adamant the other is to blame, there was no sign a solution was imminent. Tymoshenko, who was to meet with her Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, said reaching a deal to restore supplies would be extremely difficult.

Putin, in Germany early Saturday, said Russia also wants deliveries restored. But he said Moscow was only protecting its interests from what he described as Ukraine’s theft of Russian gas.

Top EU energy officials and some officials from European nations were to meet with Russian President Dmitry Medvedev in the Kremlin. He had called during the week for a Moscow summit of European gas-consuming nations, but no EU heads of state have said they would come.

Putin and Tymoshenko were expected to join the Kremlin gathering after their talks.

The EU was to be represented by the EU Energy Commissioner Andris Piebalgs and Czech Energy Minister Martin Riman, whose country holds the rotating EU presidency. Government officials from some other European nations were also expected.

The EU has threatened to review relations with the ex-Soviet neighbors if weekend talks fail to bring a resolution.

Russia was enlisting European gas companies for a consortium that could end the crisis by paying for gas needed to get Ukraine’s pipeline up and running and ensure deliveries. It was unclear whether Ukraine would agree to that proposal.

Ukraine’s leaders have accused Russia of using the dispute to seek control over its pipeline system.

Russia stopped shipping gas to Ukraine for domestic use on Jan. 1 when the countries could not agree on a price, then accused Ukraine of siphoning off gas bound for Europe and turned off the taps entirely on Jan. 7.

Russia resumed piping a limited amount gas toward Ukraine on Tuesday after both agreed to have EU monitors check flows, but the gas did not reach Europe. Russia says Ukraine is blocking shipments to European consumers, while Kiev says Russia wants to send gas along a route that would disrupt supplies to Ukrainian consumers.

Ukraine is also demanding that Russia supply the so-called “technical gas” needed to power compressors to push gas west toward Europe. Russia has insisted that it’s Ukraine that must provide that fuel.

In Germany on Friday, Putin met with chief executives of Europe’s top energy companies to put together a consortium that would provide the technical gas.

He voiced hope of quickly finalizing a deal under which European energy majors will buy some 140 million cubic meters of gas to fill Ukraine’s pipelines and then provide 21 million cubic meters of gas a day to burn in compressors. He said some of the companies suggested that they would only provide the “technical gas” on a trial basis for two to five days to see that Ukraine complies with its transit obligations.

A geopolitical struggle over Ukraine’s future underlies the commercial dispute.

Russia and Ukraine have been at odds since the 2004 Orange Revolution brought President Viktor Yushchenko to power. His avid push for Ukraine to join NATO and the European Union has angered Moscow.

(AP)