"Unfortunately, the negotiations yesterday did not bring positive results," Sergei Kupriyanov said in an interview with Russia's NTV television channel.
"We held telephone talks and exchanged faxes with our Belarusian colleagues until 1 a.m. Moscow time [10 p.m. GMT on Saturday] but failed to reach an agreement," the spokesman said, adding that Belarus's chief negotiator for talks with Gazprom has not yet arrived in Moscow.
A top executive at Belarusian government-owned pipeline company Beltransgaz said yesterday that Belarusian First Deputy Prime Minister Vladimir Semashko was ready to fly to Moscow on Saturday.
Kupriyanov reiterated that Belarus was offered the most favorable gas delivery terms, compared with other ex-Soviet republics.
Gazprom has proposed that Belarus pay $75 per 1,000 cubic meters in cash, plus $30 in shares of Beltransgaz, while it currently charges Armenia $110 per 1,000 cu m, Ukraine - $130 for Central Asian gas and Moldova - $160. In addition, Gazprom has recently signed contracts for the supply of 1.1 billion cu m of gas to Georgia in 2007 at $235 per 1,000 cu m.
"We are taking into account the [friendly] relations between our countries, but Belarus is a sovereign state and not a Russian region, therefore the prices [for natural gas] should differ," the Gazprom official said.
The state-controlled Russian natural gas monopoly earlier warned Belarus it will cut off supplies to the country at 10 a.m. Moscow time [7 a.m. GMT] on January 1 if a new agreement is not signed by that time.
