The Ukrainian authorities say a state of emergency may have to be introduced as early as next week to combat a major energy crisis.

In an interview with the BBC, the Ukrainian deputy prime-minister Yulia Timoshenko, who holds the energy and fuel portfolio, said there were now interruptions in electricity supplies of up to twelve hours a day.

Miss Timoshenko said fuel supplies were dwindling, only a third of the country's oil refineries were in operation and Ukraine's debt to Russia for energy supplies was escalating -- partly because Ukraine had been illegally siphoning off ten million dollars worth of Russian gas a day.

From the newsroom of the BBC World Service