KIEV, July 27 – Ukraine is ready to propose a project on expanding its own gas transportation system as an alternative to the construction of the South Stream gas pipeline, Prime Minister Mykola Azarov said.

"Recently we've had another idea. This is a definite alternative to South Stream: the modernization of the system of our southern gas pipelines, which will allow the supply of the same volume of gas that Russia plans to supply through South Stream to the same point in the European Union, namely Burgas in Bulgaria," he said at a briefing in Kiev on Tuesday.