Ukraine says to meet Russia in Moscow over gas dispute- agency

Ukrainian Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko and Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin spoke by telephone at midnight on Thursday, Interfax news agency said, quoting the press service.

"In the conversation, an agreement was reached to hold talks on Saturday in Moscow between the governments of the two states on the gas issue," it was quoted by Reuters as saying.

It was impossible to immediately confirm whether the meeting would be between Tymoshenko and Putin, or other ministers.

It was also unclear if leaders of other countries affected by the crisis would travel to Moscow, as Russian President Dmitry Medvedev initially proposed on Wednesday.

Ukrainian leaders originally opposed holding the meeting in Moscow, saying they preferred the summit be held in a country not involved in the dispute.

But Tymoshenko had earlier Wednesday indicated that the time had come for direct higher-level meetings to try to resolve the dispute.

"The process of negotiations must move from the Gazprom-Naftogaz level to the level of governments," she was quoted by AFP as telling a news conference.

The managers of Russia’s Gazprom and Ukraine's Naftogaz have met to resolve the row, but it has been clear that political leaders have had the final say in the dispute, and so far they have yet to meet face-to-face.

The EU relies on Russian gas pumped via Ukraine for a fifth of its supplies.

Those supplies have been halted since Russia cut them off last Wednesday, accusing Ukraine of illegally siphoning the gas for its own domestic market -- a charge vehemently denied by Ukraine.

Russia earlier cut off supplies to Ukraine on New Years Day following a dispute over payments and a failure to agree on a price for 2009.

An EU-brokered agreement on resuming gas deliveries to Europe collapsed on Tuesday with both sides blaming the other for the failure.