Ukrainian Minister: Ukraine can stop buying coal from the separatist republics
Ukraine can do without the coal that it buys from the uncontrolled territories of the LPR and DPR, as stated by the Infrastructure Minister, Volodymyr Omelyan, during an informal meeting with bloggers and experts, as reported by the Chetverta Vlada news agency.
At the same time, the Minister stressed that the purchase of coal from the separatist-held territories is a political decision that will be taken by the country's leadership.
"There is a political decision that we buy coal from those companies that operate in the in the occupied territories. Ukrzaliznytsya ensures the delivery of coal. This has to do with the coal supply to Ukraine for our thermal power plants. There have always been problems, blackmail from their side. And we were forced to give the people who service these deliveries and work on the uncontrolled territories employment in Ukrzaliznytsya and provide them with payroll cards. Today it's 30% of the number of employees who worked there before the war," the Minister said.
Answering the question of whether it's technically possible to stop buying coal from the separatist-held territories, and if Ukrainian ports have enough capacity to handle a sufficient amount of imported coal, Omelyan confirmed that this possibility exist, and in six months, Ukraine would able to fully abandon coal purchases from the separatist-held territories.
"The total capacity of the Ukrainian ports is 256 million tons per year. Last year, we had a total transshipment of 140 million. Yes, there are some physical limitations, because the platforms in the warehouses are contracted out. But if there was a clear political position on the fact that we need to provide for a certain volume of coal imports, then we would find the platforms, resources, and opportunities. This problem is solved in a maximum of six months. This is not very complicated technology. We need a usual platform, bucket, conventional cranes for ship unloading and loading into wagons at the railway. This is not high-tech, or even container transshipment, which requires special cranes," Omelyan said.