Head of Chechnya asks to forgive people’s debt for gas

MOSCOW, Apr 12 (PRIME) -- Head of the republic of Chechnya Ramzan Kadyrov asked the government and Gazprom in his Telegram channel on Friday to forgive households’ gas debts.

“Chechnya and its people hope that the government and the company (Gazprom) will meet them halfway due to the special circumstances that we are in. And such a decision would be fair,” Kadyrov said.

On Thursday, the Supreme Court of the Republic of Chechnya turned down an earlier court decision to write off households’ 9 billion ruble debt for gas.

Kadyrov said that the gas distribution network of the republic was almost fully destroyed by the 1999-2009 war, when the republic bore incalculable losses and had no possibility to control gas consumption by households.

According to Gazprom’s regional arm, Gazprom mezhregiongas, overdue debt amounted to 16.161 billion rubles, including 13.219 billion rubles of household debt.

(64.3991 rubles – U.S. $1)

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