KIEV, Feb. 27 - Energy and Fuel Minister Ivan Plachkov left for Brussels on Monday for meetings with top energy officials at the European Commission to promote investments in the country??™s power sector, the ministry said.

KIEV, Feb. 27 ??“ Ukrainian law enforcement agencies are investigating a massive scheme when hundreds of oil and gas extraction licenses have been apparently illegally issued weeks before President Leonid Kuchma had stepped down.

MOSCOW, Feb. 27 ??“ Russian gas monopoly Gazprom may purchase from its subsidiary Gazprombank a 50% stake in RosUkrEnergo, a Swiss-based gas trader it controls, for 2.3 mln euros, Interfax reported Monday.

KIEV, Feb. 27 ??“ Ukraine??™s Consumer Confidence Index, or CCI, grew in October through December 2005 after steeply declining in September, the International Center of Policy Studies said, citing a survey made in December 2005.

KIEV, Feb. 27 ??“ Russia will probably lift its ban on imports of meat and dairy products from Ukraine after general election due March 26, Agriculture Minister Oleksandr Baranivskiy said Monday.

KIEV, Feb. 27 - Turkmen President Separmurat Niyazov will probably visit Ukraine in April or May for important natural gas talks with his Ukrainian counterpart Viktor Yushchenko, a source in the Ukrainian government said Monday.

KIEV, Feb. 24 ??“ Japan's government has granted $673,000 to Ukraine from the Strategy and Human Resources Development Fund to help design the World Bank's Project for Development of Ukraine's Treasury System??“2.

BRUSSELS, Feb. 25 - A senior European Union official predicted Friday the EU will expand rapidly in the next decade, with Turkey and possibly Ukraine joining the bloc around 2015, Reuters reported.

KIEV, Feb. 24 ??“ Crude oil prices rose 10.3% at an auction in Kiev Thursday in reaction to the government??™s move to slap a tax on oil imports and in anticipation of a greater demand next month.

KIEV, Feb. 24 - A Kiev court ruled to freeze assets of the Nikopol Ferroalloy Plant (NFP), one of the world's largest ferromanganese producers, in what is likely to be the next case of a reversed privatization.