Ukraine is an important energy transferring country for the European Union (EU). Major masses of Russian and Central Asian gas are transferred via the Ukrainian gas transportation system. Ukraine's energy capacity is part and parcel of the EU energy scheme.

Currently, the EU is attempting to consolidate the possibilities of its member states and create a common European foreign policy on energy to counteract energy challenges in the future and avoid dependence on a sole supplier.

The EU's energy relations with Russia pose an obstacle to a European foreign policy on energy. Eastern European countries, that area really dependent on Russian energy, painfully respond to new projects on energy supply to Europe.

However the Baltic States and Poland actively resist the Nord Stream gas pipeline and suggest it shall run not under the Baltic Sea but across their territories. Meanwhile, Germany, Russia's main collaborator in this project, says that it is not a German, but a European one.

"It is a European, not a German project that many EU member states will have the possibility to profit from," Germany's Deputy Foreign Minister Gernot Erler spoke at recent French Institute of International Relations (IFRI) conference.

He noticed "We would like to become sure that future - for example Russian-Belarusian or Russian-Ukrainian -missunderstandings do not have any adverse consequences for consumers in Europe. So, the Nord Stream pipeline is a very important contribution to Europe's energy security."

One can create two major conclusions: first one is that the Nord Stream project is determining for Germany and second, that Russia was able to convince its European partners of the "unreliability of energy transportation via Ukraine's territory," and as a consequence, of the need to develop alternative routes.