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LISA MULLINS: Now Russia says it could resume sending natural gas to customers in Europe as early as tomorrow morning. This is good news for hundreds of thousands of central and eastern Europeans who've been affected by a cutoff of Russian supplies. There was collateral damage in what began as a financial dispute between Russia and Ukraine which controls the pipelines that deliver the gas. The World's Gerry Hadden reports.

GERRY HADDEN: It's been over a week since Russia closed its westward bound gas pipelines. It charged that Ukraine was siphoning some off for its own use. Ukraine has repeatedly denied the charge. The solution in a word: monitors. The European Union convinced both sides to let it send people to keep an eye on key transit lines that feed Europe. That was Friday. But Saturday things fell apart, after Ukraine tried to add a hand written statement to the agreemen. To wit summed up Ukrainian President Victor Yushchenko, we weren't stealing Europe's gas.

VICTOR USHENKO: We want to demonstrate in the framework of the mission that Ukraine did everything to fulfill it's obligations as a transit country.

GERRY: Russian President Dimitri Medvedev said the 11th hour addendum was a deal breaker. That news sent a shiver through Europe.

DIMITRI MEDVEDEV: Those who signed the agreement adding some amendments should realize that this document is invalid. That is why I urge the government not to fulfill the agreement with the EU signed on Saturday. I want our European colleagues to be informed that they find themselves in a very difficult situation.

GERRY: As if they needed Russia's President to tell them that, hundreds of thousands of homes mainly in Eastern Europe and the Balkans have already gone cold. Some half dozen European countries depend on Russian gas to stay warm in winter. But hope returned today when Ukraine agreed to drop the offending text from the monitoring accord. Eva Vokusich is a resident in the Bosnian capital Sarajevo. She says news of the deal came just in time.

EVA VOKUSICH: I've been following the news in Sarajevo over the last ten days or even more it's been minus ten average daily temperature probably minus five. Thousands of people have been affected. And the situation really wasn't something that we were, I mean we were looking forward to seeing it end. So in any case we're pretty relieved right now but also very cautious not to be too optimistic too early.

GERRY: European Union leaders are also expressing cautious relief, and not just because the immediate danger to citizens is likely over. The crisis has begged an embarrassing question: why can't the EU supply its own members with emergency gas? Part of the answer is that there is simply no infrastructure to pump gas on a large scale from western reserves to the east. And there appears to be little political will to change that. Instead Europe is focusing on two other gas projects with Russia again as supplier. The projects are called Nordstream and Southstream. Both proposed pipelines would steer clear of Ukraine and any destabilizing disputes that might arise in the future. This, as many Europeans are calling for less dependence on Russia, not more. For The World, I'm Gerry Hadden.

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