Opening address by Prime Minister of Ukraine Arseniy Yatsenyuk at a session of the Government on May 27, 2014

Dear members of the Cabinet of Ministers, heads of local administrations and mayors!

I congratulate the citizens of Ukraine on the election of the President of our state. It was one of the program principles of the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine, namely the holding of fair and transparent elections. Thanks to our joint work the current election campaign should be supposed one of the most transparent, open and fair.

Not a single administrative resource was used within this campaign. We could do everything to ensure that there are no more so-called election carousels, a disappearing ink, hundreds of thousands of fake ballots and altered protocols. Therefore, the Ukrainian people made their choice and the Ukrainian state has its President.

On behalf of the Government of Ukraine I congratulate Petro Oleksiyovych! I am convinced that the new President, the Government and the Parliament will do everything, expected by the Ukrainian people and what encouraged the Ukrainian people to go to the Maidan.

I express hope that the Central Elections Commission, which used every efforts to conduct these elections in the shortest terms, will sum up the results and officially announce the results of the elections, and the President will take office and begin to perform his duties as soon as possible

As the Prime Minister of Ukraine, I will officially announce my position concerning future work and activities of the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine and interaction between the legislative and executive branches and the President of Ukraine.

As to current issues, I would like to emphasize once again that the situation is difficult, but controlled, and today we will consider the 2015 state budget as well as execution of the current state budget.

We decided together with the Ministry of Finance concerning payments for unprotected sections of the state and local budgets. Over the last 3 months the situation was extremely difficult, it still remains difficult, but we have invented the resource that we received from our international donors, and UAH 2.5 billion will be distributed to all local budgets. I know that you have accumulated a mass of payment orders, and this is the first time over three months when we decided to help local communities.

Secondly, concerning the current state budge execution, I would like O.V. Shlapak to inform clearly of indices of the current year and what to expect in the next year. Yesterday we held a broad meeting on the 2015 budget, and the main challenge for the Government now is that if we apply standard approaches to economic development in the country, so in modern conditions such approaches are ineffective.

I set the task once again for the Ministry of Economy and relevant ministries: the standard bureaucratic approaches being in Ukraine for the 23 years concerning the modernization of the Ukrainian economy have reached the point where the economy has gone. That is why, along with our European partners, we have created a support group for Ukraine. Every ministry will have an expert in the European Union, who will help Ukraine fulfill the Agreement between Ukraine and the EU and bring us closer to the European Union and European standards.

Today we are going to announce the decision that a separate post of Deputy Minister for European integration issues will be established at all ministries of Ukraine. Every reform that is needed for the country and that complies with European standards, will be implemented by the ministries, and it is our priority. An appropriate Deputy Minister of the Cabinet of Ministers on the issues of European integration will coordinate this issue from the “key center” at the Cabinet of Ministers. The appropriate Department is and will be at his/her disposal.

The period of pre-arbitration settlement of the dispute between Naftogaz Ukraine and Russian gas monopoly Gazprom expires on May 29. Russia has not made a single step to settle this dispute yet, there's no time left. If Naftogaz and Gazprom do not sign an appropriate agreement, which will meet the pre-arbitration claim sent by Ukraine almost a month ago by May 29, it means we will be seeing Russia's Gazprom in court.

My position on this issue is unchanged: Ukraine is ready to pay for the gas purchased, saying that debts should be repaid. We just have to sign documents to pay our debts. This is the first.

Secondly, we want to hear from Russia, including on the issue of returning to Ukraine the 2.2 billion cubic meters of gas that Russia stole through Chornomornaftogaz in Crimea. It's $1 billion at Gazprom’s prices. I’ m not talking about Ukraine's losses from the joining of Crimea to Russia that "are in the billions."

Therefore, if we are for justice, we will have a fair, honest and straight talk. So Russia has one-sided justice: everything they say is all right, all they do, attacking the country, undermining global security system, destroying borders - it turns out to comply with international law, and the fact that Ukraine together with the international community is demanding to return Crimea, to return the Ukrainian state property, to sign an agreement that would meet the basic market principles, as it is unprofitable for Russia, that is, from their point of view, wrong.

As to the negotiations with the Russian Federation. The Government’s position on this issue is also unchanged. Bilateral negotiations are not possible in the current situation without the involvement of the U.S. and the EU. Just try to start bilateral negotiations with them [Russia]-they will surely fool you and with an intelligent and confident face Russia will say then that it was so.

We are hoping that our Russian neighbors will be reasonable and we will sign an appropriate agreement between Naftogaz and Gazprom.

Also I would like to reiterate that we have offered our European and American partners - Russia is not a member of the Energy Charter Treaty, Russia is not a member of the Energy Community, that we have completely different legal framework. Ukraine is a member of the Energy Charter, Ukraine takes the third energy package, that is why under this gas crisis, we need to build a new energy market in Europe.