Russia, Ukraine to resume gas talks, says Gazprom spokesman

Russian and Ukrainian officials aimed to resume negotiations Tuesday on resolving a price dispute that led to a cutoff of Ukraine's natural gas supply, but Russia gave no indication it was in the mood for compromise.

Russia stopped selling natural gas to the neighboring country of 48 million on Sunday after Ukraine rejected its demand for a more-than-fourfold price increase.

The dispute has raised anxiety throughout Europe, which gets about a quarter of its gas from Russia, some 80 percent of that amount coming in pipelines that cross &to=http://english.pravda.ru/comp/2002/06/21/30914.html' target=_blank>Ukraine. European customers on Monday reported supply falloffs, after which Russia boosted the amount going into Ukrainian pipelines; supplies in Europe appeared to be returning to normal on Tuesday.

State gas monopoly &to=http://english.pravda.ru/main/18/89/356/13883_gazprom.html' target=_blank>Gazprom claims it had to boost the amount because Ukraine is stealing Europe-bound gas. Ukrainian officials hotly deny that.