Vladimir Putin and his Ukrainian counterpart were on Friday night edging towards a deal to reopen gas supplies before winter sets in.
The Russian president held one-on-one talks with Petro Poroshenko on the sidelines of a summit in Milan to resolve two thorny issues; the fragile ceasefire in eastern Ukraine and a possible energy deal.
They made little progress on the first, but after meeting Putin alongside the German chancellor, Angela Merkel, and France’s president, François Hollande, Poroshenko was quoted as saying the “basic parameters” of a new gas contract with Russia had been settled on.
Moscow turned off the gas taps to its neighbour in June following a pricing dispute, and concerns are mounting about what a shortage could mean for Ukraine – and potentially the European Union – this winter.
Leaders cautioned that further discussion was necessary on how to finance the potential deal, and EU officials said they expected talks to continue in Brussels next week.
The positive tone was backed by Hollande who said an agreement was “now truly within reach”.
It was a contrast to earlier in the day, when a Kremlin spokesman condemned unidentified participants as “absolutely biased, non-flexible, non-diplomatic”.
David Cameron, his Italian counterpart Matteo Renzi and top EU officials had joined Merkel, Hollande, Putin and Poroshenko for a meeting that Italian and British diplomatic sources described, with trademark understatement, as “frank”.
Cameron was among the EU leaders who challenged Putin to say he would denounce elections planned by separatist rebels in eastern Ukraine next month as a key sign of commitment to the peace plan.
Despite the ceasefire struck on 5 September between Kiev’s forces and separatist rebels violence has continued to flare in some parts of eastern Ukraine. More than 3,000 people have died in the conflict.
The Russian president “would not commit” to denouncing the rival polls scheduled for 2 November by pro-Russia rebels, a Downing Street source said.
The move by the leaders of the self-declared people’s republics of Luhansk and Donetsk to bring forward polling day has become a sticking point in discussions.
Germany, France and Italy were understood to have reiterated their desire to send drones to help monitor the Ukraine-Russia border.
After the meeting Cameron said that Putin had made it clear he didn’t “want a frozen conflict…[or] a divided Ukraine” but that he would need to act if he wanted EU sanctions to be eased.
“But if that’s the case,” he added, “Russia now needs to take the actions to put in place all that’s been agreed: getting Russian troops out of Ukraine, getting heavy weapons out of Ukraine and respecting all the written agreements and only recognising one legitimate set of Ukrainian elections.
“And if those things don’t happen then clearly the European Union, Britain included, must keep in place the sanctions and the pressure so that we don’t have this sort of conflict in our continent.”
There were mixed messages from Russia, which continues to deny all reports of its military activity in Ukraine.
Putin initially told reporters the meeting had been positive, but a Kremlin spokesman later said the talks were “indeed difficult, full of misunderstandings, disagreements, but they are nevertheless ongoing, the exchange of opinion is in progress”, the spokesman Dmitry Peskov said.
Putin arrived at the 8am meeting on Friday justhours after being seen by reporters leaving the Milan residence of former prime minister and old friend Silvio Berlusconi, shortly after 3.30am.
Russia has been accused of using gas supplies as a pawn in political power play against adversaries in eastern Europe. Complicating matters on Friday, a Polish lieutenant-colonel was sentenced to three months in jail for spying for Russia, according to AFP. The unidentified officer was arrested on Wednesday with a Russian lawyer, also suspected of spying. “The two cases are linked but that does not mean that the two men were working in tandem,” prosecutor general Andrzej Seremet was quoted as saying by the Polish news agency PAP.
