Ukrainian Prime Minister Arseniy Yatseniuk has welcomed the start of an investigation into whether Russia's OJSC Gazprom violated Ukrainian law regarding the protection of economic competition, which has been launched by the Antimonopoly Committee of Ukraine.

"I ask head of the Antimonopoly Committee of Ukraine jointly with our European partners to do their best to punish Gazprom for abuse of monopoly on the Ukrainian market," he said while presenting the new head of the Antimonopoly Committee of Ukraine Yuriy Terentyev on Monday.

As reported, the cabinet approved the instruction addressed to the committee concerning the violation of competition laws by Gazprom on April 22, 2015.

Yatseniuk said at the time that Kyiv planned to hold a joint investigation with the EU into Gazprom's monopoly on markets in the EU and Ukraine.