Brussels, 02/05/2006 (Agence Europe) - Following the commentaries made by the Russian authorities about the European energy market (EUROPE 9181), a letter was sent to the Russian Energy Minister, Victor Khristenko, on Monday, from the Austrian Minister for the Economy and President of the Council, Martin Bartenstein and the Energy Commissioner, Andris Piebalgs, which aims to provide clarifications on key point in the bilateral gas trade. Recognising that Russia and Gazprom in particular “have been and remain, a reliable supplier of natural gas to the European Union”, Bartenstein and Piebalgs call for bilateral relations to be maintained “in a position of mutually beneficial inter-dependence”. They also stated that, “The rules applied to Gazprom will be no different to those applied to these and other companies”. They also stated that the fact that Gazprom “is the exclusive exporter of gas from Russia to the EU” would be taken into account in any objective analysis but concluded that “there is clearly no question of any discrimination”.