Ukraine has started electricity imports from Russia as domestic thermal power plants experience problems with coal supplies. The state company Petroleos de Venezuela S.A. announced a new agreement with Gazprom concerning the Russian monopoly’s first foreign project to produce liquefied natural gas. Gazprom will invest about $850 million in the course of seven years and receive the income from the sale of 700,000 tons of liquefied natural gas, that is, about $420 million at current prices, per year. Ukraine’s President Viktor Yushchenko urged his country’s government to sign a contract for natural gas shipments from Russia’s OAO Gazprom for domestic use in 2009.