In the meeting with the President of the European Council Herman Van Rompuy, President of the Republic of Lithuania Dalia Grybauskaitė underlined that Lithuania would ask the European Union to envisage funds in its new financial perspective for the post-closure maintenance of the Ignalina Nuclear Power Plant and for the construction of electricity connections with Western Europe. READ MORE

Ukraine will ensure the transit of Russian gas to EU countries and hopes for the EU support to introducing market principles in gas sector, President Viktor Yushchenko has said following the 13th Ukraine-EU Summit in Kyiv. READ MORE

Having visited Washington and New York a couple of times in the last months Rumiana Jeleva, Bulgaria’s Foreign Minister and now Europe’s potential European Commission Commissioner for International Cooperation, Humanitarian Aid and Crisis Response, spoke to New Europe about the shifting geopolitics of gas and the South East Europe region. READ MORE

Moscow has reiterated pledges to improve Russian energy security by promising sizable investments to develop its hydrocarbon sector and power supply networks. However, the economic viability of such solutions appears to remain a matter of debate as Moscow’s ambitious plans require huge investments. Russian authorities have long pledged to replace obsolete and wasteful Soviet-era energy technologies and solutions by what officials describe as “energy-efficient” facilities. READ MORE

After a walkout by opposition Communists, Moldova's parliament failed to elect a president in its second try since November, plunging Europe's poorest country further into uncertainty. READ MORE

President Traian Basescu has been re-elected in a neck-and-neck runoff against challenger Mircea Geoana. But his rival's party says there has been election rigging and will contest the result. READ MORE

Serbia is one step closer to its goal of EU membership after the Netherlands agreed on Monday to unfreeze a trade agreement with the former Yugoslav republic, which has improved cooperation with the UN war crimes court. READ MORE

Climate-change skeptics are barking up the wrong smokestack. The shell game being played isn't with the science, it's with the solutions -- specifically, the carbon emissions targets that enlightened world leaders are pledging to meet. That's where the numbers don't add up. READ MORE

Sometimes even a symbolic gesture carries a lot of weight, and the US’ decision to station troops and Patriot missiles in Poland, however minimal, is meant to stave off Polish defense fears and save political face. READ MORE

Considering the rapprochement of Russia and Uzbekistan observed in the middle of the first decade of the ХХIst century, the number of Russian companies, and first of all Gazprom and LUKOIL, managed to become leaders within Uzbekistani oil and gas industry and to “book” a number of biggest gas fields in the Republic being supported by the Government of the Russian Federation. READ MORE