Moscow  - Russian energy company Gazprom on Saturday threatened to cut off gas deliveries to Ukraine starting January 1 unless Ukraine pays 2.4 billion dollars of debt and finalizes new contracts for future deliveries.

Gazprom spokesman Sergei Kupriyanov, quoted by the Interfax News Agency, dismissed arguments from Kiev that payments had been delayed due to the ongoing financial crisis.

"If the Ukrainian economy were really in a crisis, they would need less energy from us. There has been no sign of that," he said, adding that Ukraine cannot expect to receive billion-dollar bail- outs from the International Monetary Fund on the one hand and refuse to pay its debts to Russia on the other.

Moscow  - President Dmitry Medvedev is due to visit Venezuela and Cuba as part of a week-long tour through South America that underscores Russia's revival of Soviet-era ties in the region along old lines of opposition to US hegemony.

Medvedev's four-nation trip began Friday in Peru at the forum of Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation, or APEC, where he will participate alongside outgoing US President George W Bush and Chinese President Hu Jintao.

Tallinn  - Estonia's president, Toomas Hendrik Ilves, on Friday called on his countrymen to set aside ethnic differences in a speech in the capital, Tallinn.

"An ethnic Russian who is a resident of Estonia is not a priori the supporter of Russia's national policies, just as every Estonian is not automatically a supporter of the [Andrus] Ansip government. Citizens of democratic countries do not connect their love of country with the person of the prime minister or president who happens to be in power at the time," Ilves said.

Andrus Ansip is the current prime minister of Estonia.

Madrid - Concern was mounting in Spain on Friday over a possible Russian purchase of nearly 30 per cent of the country's largest oil company Repsol YPF, with the governing Socialists appearing divided over the issue.

Repsol should remain a "clearly Spanish and independent" company, senior European affairs official Diego Lopez Garrido said amid reports that the Russian oil giant Lukoil was about to become Repsol's main shareholder.

Madrid - Spain's stock market watchdog CNMV on Friday suspended trade in stocks of the oil company Repsol amid reports that Russian oil giant Lukoil was about to acquire nearly 30 per cent of Repsol.

The CNMV also suspended the stocks of Criteria, a holding of La Caixa bank, which admitted to being in talks with Lukoil about selling all or part of its 12.5-per-cent stake in Repsol to the Russian company.

Lukoil was also reported to be in talks with the construction company Sacyr Vallehermoso, which holds a 20-per-cent stake in Repsol.

Sacyr stocks rose by nearly 14 per cent after trading opened, on top of a 13-per-cent surge on Thursday. Repsol and Criteria shares dropped by more than 2 per cent.