Russia's OAO Gazprom (GAZP.RS) Monday said Ukraine had signed a deal allowing monitors to be posted on its westbound gas pipelines, a move that should pave the way for Russian gas shipments to Europe to resume in the coming days.
Russia hopes Ukraine's signing of the deal will allow Russian gas supplies to Europe to resume, a spokesman for Prime Minister Vladimir Putin said.
"Gazprom is ready, willing and insisting to resume gas supplies to Europe," Dmitry Peskov told a conference call.
He said Gazprom's Chief Executive Alexei Miller and Deputy Prime Minister Igor Sechin could sign a revised version of the monitor document signed by Ukraine during a visit to Brussels Monday.
Russia halted gas shipments to Europe through Ukraine last week amid a standoff with its neighbor over prices and transit fees.
The European Union has since sought to broker a deal to station European, Russian and Ukrainian monitors across the pipeline route to Europe in a bid to restart supplies.
Having almost succeeded Sunday, Moscow reneged, voicing objections to a Ukrainian demand that it be permitted to take Russian gas en route to Europe for technical purposes.
Gazprom said Monday's agreement was signed by Ukraine "without any additional clauses."
Moscow has promised that as soon as the monitoring terms are in place, it will resume gas deliveries to Europe, which gets a quarter of its gas from Russia and is currently experiencing freezing winter temperatures.
Peskov didn't say when gas supplies would resume, but said there would first be a "technical period" which Gazprom would try to make as short as possible.
"Certainly it will take some time before gas flows to Europe can actually be resumed," he said.
Ukraine's state energy firm, Naftogaz, said in a statement that some monitors were already in place but were awaiting the green light from Gazprom before commencing their work.
Ukraine has said the first Russian gas should arrive in Europe around 36 hours after Russia switches the taps back on.
The cutoff to Europe echoes a previous dispute between Moscow and Kiev in 2006 and has once again raised questions over Russia's reliability as an energy supplier.