London (Platts)--8Jan2009

The European Commission Thursday said the reputations of Russia and
Ukraine were at risk from the ongoing gas crisis, and said the EU was willing
to send monitors to check on the situation immediately.

He also called on Russia's Gazprom and Ukraine's Naftogaz Ukrayiny to end
their dispute and behave as "they say they are."

Commission spokesman Johannes Laitenberger said in Brussels that what is
at stake is the "credibility and reliability of Russia as a supply country, of
Ukraine as a transit country, of Gazprom as a major global energy supply
company, and of Naftogaz as major transit company."

"If both sides behave as they say they are, there should be no problem,
but there is a problem. Both sides must behave immediately as they say they
are to resume supply," Laitenberger.

Russia and Ukraine have continued to blame each other for the escalating
gas crisis that has seen a total halt in Russian gas supplies via Ukraine to
Europe, and EU countries beginning to report zero deliveries of gas.

Gazprom has said Ukraine has fully shut down all of the export pipelines
to Europe, while Ukraine said it was Russia that had halted supplies to the
Ukraine border for transit to Europe first.

"Transit has to be restored immediately," Laitenberger said.

He said the EU would send monitors, but only if it was to witness a
change to the situation.

"As the EU, we are ready to send observers immediately to help the
situation. But we do not want to send observers to see that the situation is
not changing, we want to send them to show it is changing," he said.