Gas comedy theatre continues:
Ukraine in its negotiations with Russia demands that the clause prohibiting re-export of gas must be removed
But I thought Russia loved the free market? If Russia wants to micromanage who gets what and at what price, then the Ukraine should be charging additional fees to pay for the risks from the additional gas passing through its land. If another country increases its gas consumption, who will pay the maintenance costs on the Ukrainian pipelines?
Are you kidding or just not familiar with the software licenses terms in the USA (the vale of
democracy free market) where reselling of software is strictly prohibited in most cases?
I was being ironic, and I see what you did there. A subtle attempt to talk about a different country in a different part of the world, on an unrelated topic? Just guessing.
My bad, I didn't notice you were being ironic!
Since you did not answer anything in my post, perhaps a repeat is necessary:
If Russia wants to micromanage who gets what and at what price, then the Ukraine should be charging additional fees to pay for the risks from the additional gas passing through its land. If another country increases its gas consumption, who will pay the maintenance costs on the Ukrainian pipelines?
In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if the above, or some slight variation, is what has been happening all along, but Russia has not been honouring those costs and the Ukraine obviously can't doing anything about it apart from paying less for the gas. So they just say "Ukraine has been stealing our gas".
It seems that now I don't even get where you are aiming at... If
another country increases its gas consumption, why should Gasprom (Russia) be charged additional fees or fines? As I know, Gasprom pays Ukraine the transportation costs on a per volume basis, so the maintenance costs are effectively out of the question (not Gasprom's business) since the latter are part of the former...
