KIEV, Ukraine, March 3 (UPI) -- The top executive at Naftogaz Ukrainy, the state oil and gas company, submitted his resignation to government officials, sources said Wednesday.
Oleg Dubina, the chief executive of joint-stock company Naftogaz Ukrainy handed in his letter of resignation to the Ukrainian Cabinet, Russia's ITAR-Tass news agency reports, citing government sources.
A subsidiary of Naftogaz Ukrainy operates the Ukrainian oil and natural gas transit network. It also has a footprint in Egypt and the United Arab Emirates.
Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko said in December that the company was "in fact bankrupt." The company struggled through 2009 to pay gas debts to Russia as the global recession battered the Ukrainian economy.
Russian energy giant Gazprom cut gas supplies to Ukraine briefly in 2009 because of lingering disputes over debts. A contract settling that dispute placed severe restrictions on the Kiev energy sector if it broke its obligations to Moscow.
Energy ties between Kiev and Moscow are a matter of concern for Europe. European customers get around 20 percent of their gas from Russia and 80 percent of that supply travels through Soviet-era pipelines in Ukraine.
European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso told Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych that the European Union needed "urgent progress on modernization and restructuring of the (Ukrainian) gas sector."
