Ukraine has passed a critical period in the energy sector in the current heating season, avoiding restrictions on energy consumption, and has all the resources for further stable energy supply, Acting Energy Minister of Ukraine Yuriy Vitrenko said.

"We went through the worst period, when there were really high risks of rolling blackouts. But it is already getting warmer, Khmelnytsky NPP power unit has come out of repair, we do not use gas blocks at TPPs and gas reserves in underground gas storage facilities are record-breaking for this period. There is a reserve for both electricity and gas," Vitrenko said on the air of the Svoboda Slova (Freedom of Speech) program on the ICTV television channel on the evening of Monday, February 22.

At the same time, he accused the Russian Federation of artificially creating a gas deficit on the European market.

"Russia this year has reduced gas supplies through Ukraine to the European market by half, creating an artificial deficit there," the minister said, stressing that this led to an increase in the price for the resource.

At the same time, Vitrenko stressed that Ukraine has all the prerequisites so as not to feel a deficit of energy resources in the event of restrictions on their supplies by the Russian Federation as its response to the imposition of sanctions by Ukraine, in particular, against Russian companies and the decision to return the Ukrainian section of the Samara-Western Direction oil product pipeline to state ownership.

"We can safely go through the next wave of Russian aggression. As for diesel fuel, there is no critical dependence on its supply through the pipe," he noted, pointing out that if diesel supplies are not sufficient from Russia and Belarus, Ukraine will buy it on the world market.

As reported, the transit of Russian natural gas through Ukraine hit the lowest in the last 12 months amid a record thaw in Europe.