NIYAZOV,S 2/17 GAZPROM, UKRAINIAN VISITORS:

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 02 ASHGABAT 000215 SIPDIS SIPDIS STATE FOR SCA/CEN (PERRY),SCA/CEN DAS GASTRIGHT, EUR DAS BRYZA E.O. 12958: DECL: 02/21/2016 TAGS: ENRG EPET PREL RS TX UP SUBJECT: NIYAZOV,S 2/17 GAZPROM, UKRAINIAN VISITORS: DECISIONS DEFERRED REF: ASHGABAT 209 Classified By: Ambassador Tracey Ann Jacobson, reasons 1.4 (b) and (d) SUMMARY -------------- ¶1. (C) GazProm CEO Miller,s February 17 visit to Ashgabat came and went without known result; FM Meredov told Ambassador that Niyazov deferred any new energy-sector decisions for at least two months. Far less reassuringly, Ukraine energy officials, talks the same day with GOTX counterparts and Niyazov produced only harshly-worded public demands by the latter for Kyiv to pay its past gas debts. The Ukrainian Embassy DCM calls GOTX/Kyiv relations now "the worst in the last five or six years." He admits the GoU,s debt, but says his Embassy is convinced Niyazov is just using it as a pretext for discontinuing gas sales to Ukraine, and that the ultimate disposition of Turkmen gas for the next few years will be determined not in Ashgabat but by Ukraine,s election and Moscow,s further machinations thereafter. END SUMMARY. ¶2. (C) Background: FM Meredov called Ambassador at 11 pm Friday, February 17 to inform her that President Niyazov had taken her brief message (delivered during the opening ceremony of the new Textile Ministry on Friday morning immediately prior to Niyazov,s meeting with GazProm CEO Miller; Reftel) on board. Meredov had also briefed Niyazov on the fuller version of the talking points Ambassador gave him after buttonholing Niyazov. As a result, said Meredov, Niyazov did not sign any new agreements with the Gazprom delegation on either joint ventures or gas supply volumes/prices beyond the current 2006 agreement for 30 bcm at $65/tcm. Instead, Niyazov told Miller the GOTX would study its proposals for another two months. Press and other sources have indicated that Niyazov undertook to settle future supplies and volumes "in the second half of the year" or "after September." The GOTX statement after these meetings referred anodynely to their content. From the Russian side, Miller and others were quoted as saying there are no issues concerning either the volume or the price of Turkmen gas sales to Russia. The GOTX statement was silent on that subject. ¶3. (SBU) Following the meeting with Miller, Niyazov and his officials met likewise with the Ukrainian delegation headed by Minister Plachkov and Havtogaz Chief Ivchenko. In howling contrast to the conventional tone of the Gazprom-visit communiqu, the MFA summary of that meeting attacked the Ukrainian participants for their "deeply unconstructive" approach. Namely: the GoU delegation purportedly not only came unprepared to settle what the GOTX described as its $159 million in overdue debt for past gas sales, but denied the debt,s existence. Niyazov himself was quoted as saying that the Ukrainians, attitude was such as to preclude negotiations for future gas-sale arrangements. Media report that Yuschenko subsequently phoned Niyazov, evinced surprise at the reported debts, and promised to look into the matter. ¶4. (C) Ukrainian Ambassador told Ambassador Saturday the GoU side had been ready to hear from Niyazov that Turkmenistan simply was powerless to supply gas because of Russia,s refusal to let it be transshipped. What galled them was Niyazov,s instead harping on the issue of Ukraine,s debt as justification for not even admitting that the gas remains contractually due for delivery to Ukraine. In fact, the supposed debt is being paid off in accord with the agreed-upon schedule, according to the Ukrainian. ¶5. (C) We subsequently met with the Ukrainian Embassy DCM (protect),who offered extra details. He echoed his chief,s account of Niyazov and his GOTX underlings having from the meeting,s start launched into sustained attacks over the unpaid debt -- self-evidently having no wish to discuss or resolve the issue. Unlike his boss, the Ukrainian DCM did not assert that the GoU is current on its debt payments. Rather (as in our most recent meeting two weeks ago),he admitted that the GoU remained dozens of millions of dollars ASHGABAT 00000215 002 OF 002 in debt, even after a large payment this January. He repeated to us his opinion that Yushchenko has been lied-to on this and other issues by certain of his energy advisors, first and foremost Ivanchenko, whom Plachkov hates but is impotent to fire due to his central role in financing Yushchenko,s election campaigns. ¶6. (C) That said, it was also a fact (the DCM proceeded to claim) that of the $159 million in GoU debt, two-thirds is in the form of goods and services, used as payment under the barter element of the existing bilateral gas-delivery arrangement, which either are en route or have actually already arrived at Turkmenistan,s borders - but not been accepted for delivery. The GOTX is willfully stalling on doing so, and its motive is not to squeeze more money but "purely" to solidify its excuse for discontinuing future gas contracts or shipments to Ukraine, opined the DCM. In regard to hard-currency payments, there is no current debt due at all, according to the Ukrainian. ¶7. (U) Meanwhile, gas does continue to reach Ukraine, which for now is apparently not even being billed for it. But since, on the books, no Turkmen gas is being officially sold, the GoU may fear at least one of two scenarios, both bad: (i) even if Ashghabat finally "agrees" to sell Ukraine,s full agreed 2006 volume of 40 bcm, it will all be considered as having been shipped in the second half of the year, at $60/tcm vs. the $50 that by agreement was to have been charged for first-half-2006 sales; and/or (ii) Gazprom in turn may claim that all gas delivered to Ukraine since January 1 has been Gazprom,s own, Russian product, hence costing in excess of $200/tcm. ¶8. (C) In practice, these pipeline and price machinations are mere secondary, background factors, the DCM believed. They will be left to hang fire pending Ukraine,s election results. Thereafter, Moscow can be expected to re-calibrate and escalate its energy-supply pressures in accordance with the results. Should Akhmetov, Yanukovych et al win power, Moscow may proceed to offer Ukraine an especially naked choice: cheap power tariffs in return for large-scale rapprochement. In any case, for now the bottom line is that events in Ashgabat may be close to irrelevant to determining where Turkmenistan,s gas will ultimately be sold, he thought. ¶9. (C) The extreme harshness of Niyazov,s and the GOTX,s public attacks on Ukraine,s debt and visiting delegation was not unprecedented, but bilateral relations are certainly now "the worst in at least the last five or six years", our interlocutor thought. He said his ambassador had convened all his Embassy personnel immediately after the GoU delegation,s visit to warn them that the bilateral atmosphere has become hostile, and to brace for manifestations of GOTX displeasure, if not open harassment. ¶10. (C) COMMENT. Niyazov may or may not have been on the verge of feeling forced to commit himself to a longer-term agreement with the Russians before these twin visits. In any case, the TCP apparently can now at a minimum count on at least a two-month reprieve. But the official treatment of the Ukrainians bodes ill for the ultimate outcome. To fend off Russian pressure, Niyazov clearly will need something more concrete than expressions of Western interest in TCP. JACOBSON