KIEV, Jan. 31 – Prime Minister Mykola Azarov compared Ukraine to Greece last week when he tried to persuade International Monetary Fund Managing Director Christine Legarde to resume a $15.5 billion loan to the country.

Azarov flew to Zurich on Thursday for a meeting with Legarde after a Ukrainian government team had failed to impress IMF officials in Washington.

“I told her that Ukraine is a member of the IMF, just as well as Greece,” Azarov said at a meeting with entrepreneurs.

Greece was bailed out by the IMF and by the European Union to prevent a default on its debt, and the country’s fiscal troubles has been widely seen by officials as potentially capable of triggering a world economic crisis.

“Greece now has 150 billion euros written off, while another 250 billion euros is being restructured,” Azarov said. “Our country is five times bigger than Greece in terms of population, and our problems are not any smaller.”

Ukraine needs to resume borrowing from the IMF as soon as possible as the country has to repay the Fund at least $3.8 billion this year, of which $600 million must be repaid next month.

But the IMF, including Lagarde at the meeting with Azarov, has refused to resume the lending to Ukraine because the government failed to hike natural gas prices for households, one of its most crucial demands.

The government has argued that hiking the gas prices now would be a mistake and may even hurt the economy by triggering a wave of arrears.

Analysts said that the real reason for failing to hike the prices is that the government, including President Viktor Yanukovych, are concerned the measure would hurt the ruling Regions Party at upcoming elections in October.

But Azarov again reiterated the government’s position that hiking the gas prices now would be a serious economic and even social problem.

He said that most of Ukraine’s residential complexes were built during the era of the former Soviet Union and lack major energy efficiency features, which is leading to high gas consumption.

“Now the gas price has increased perhaps by hundreds times compared with the Soviet era,” Azrov said. “The question is why our people have to pay for the fact that they live in such imperfect homes with such energy costs.”

Azarov argued that the government should try to invest in energy efficiency across Ukraine because hiking the gas price.

“We are told that the gas must cost as much as it costs,” Azarov said. “But first we have to modernize our housing complex. Then we can say: now, dear friends, please pay what it costs.” (tl/ez)