Meanwhile, Kyiv could replace the lost power with imports from Romania and Poland, Galushchenko said. Warsaw has already offered its support in case of a cutoff.
If “the goal [is] to make Ukraine [in] pain,” he said, “it doesn’t work in this situation.”
Slovakia and Hungary, led by the Russia-friendly Fico and Viktor Orbán, have been for months trying to convince Kyiv to renew the gas deal, which expires on Tuesday night.
Although the gas supplies transiting Ukraine account for around 5 percent of the EU’s total imports, the two countries have argued an end to the deal would threaten their security of supply and asked Brussels to support their efforts to prolong it — calls the Commission has repeatedly rebuffed.
Fico met with Russian leader Vladimir Putin in Moscow in a surprise visit over the Christmas holidays to discuss gas supplies, prompting Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy to charge the Slovakian leader with weakening Europe. Central European firms have also urged the gas deal to be extended.
Still, experts have argued there is little risk that Slovakia would face energy shortages if the deal ends as expected, with the country more concerned with retaining the revenues it earns from transporting and reselling the Russian supplies. A senior Ukrainian official last week estimated that Slovakia earns around half a billion dollars a year from access to the discounted gas.
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