Ukraine will not link the conviction this week of former Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko to future gas talks with Moscow in order to get a revision of its gas deals, Prime Minister Mykola Azarov said on Wednesday.
Tymoshenko was convicted of abuse of office on Tuesday for signing a 2009 gas deal with Russia without consulting her government.
"The gas question is very important for us and we are not mixing it with any other issue, it is separate," Azarov told reporters.
Kommersant Ukraina business daily reported earlier on Wednesday that Ukraine might use the verdict as an argument in gas talks with Moscow to revise the agreement, quoting an Energy Ministry source.
The gas deal tied the price for Russian gas to international oil prices which have risen strongly since 2009 boosting Ukraine's bill. The contract says Ukraine must import no less than 33 billion cubic meters of gas from Russia. Ukraine is set to pay about $400 per thousand cubic meters of imported Russian gas in the fourth quarter of this year.
Kiev insists on reducing both the price and the volume of imports.