Yushchenko led last year's 'orange revolution' on a platform of firmly placing Ukraine, which has for centuries been under Moscow's influence, in the Western ambit, which would include eventual membership of the European Union and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. Blocking the way, however, is Russia's stranglehold over Ukraine's energy supplies. Thanks to a Soviet-era pipeline network, Moscow either sells or transports more than 80% of Kiev's annual oil and gas needs. "We fully realize that this is a danger to our independence," Deputy Prime Minister Oleg Rybachuk told an investment conference in June when asked about Russia's dominance of the Ukrainian energy market. "There is more attention being paid (within the government) to getting off the hook than to any other topic," he said. "The president probably knows more about energy than the energy minister himself.". Sandwiched between the EU's eastern border and Russia, and hugging most of the Black Sea's northern coastline, Ukraine is already an important transit country for European energy: nearly all of Russia's gas exports to Europe pass through it. But Yushchenko's team has sought to exploit Ukraine's geography to drastically alter how Kiev gets its energy and further increase the country's importance as a crossroads for European oil and gas. During its first five months in office, Yushchenko's administration has feverishly sought new ways to get oil and gas and has intensely lobbied foreign states and investors to join such projects, and energy co-operation has topped the agenda of nearly all of Yushchenko's trips abroad and of nearly all foreign visitors to Kiev: . when Yushchenko went to Kazakhstan in late May, he left with an agreement to increase Kazakh oil shipments to Ukraine and to start construction of a liquefied natural gas terminal in Crimea. . when the president visited Turkey in June, he revived a dormant project to build a pipeline that would deliver Caspian oil to the Turkish city of Samsun, from where it would be shipped by tankers across the Black Sea to Odessa. . during visits to France by Yushchenko and prime minister Yulia Tymoshenko, Kiev lobbied the French to join a project that would construct a pipeline from Iranian gas fields to Ukraine. . when Czech President Vaclav Klaus visited Kiev, Prague's possible participation in expanding an existing oil pipeline topped his talks with Yushchenko. . "We respect Russia, but Ukraine's energy independence is a national priority for us, and we will do everything possible to ensure that the issue of energy independence will be solved during the first years of the new government," Tymoshenko said recently. Among the top projects being pursued are the construction of a gas pipeline from Iran to Ukraine, an enlargement of the existing Odessa-Brody oil pipeline into Poland so that it delivers Caspian crude to the European market, and participation in the Arab Gas Pipeline consortium to extend the section of that pipe from Turkey to Ukraine. . Although politics is the driving force behind such projects, economics will ultimately determine their success, analysts say. "The more transit countries you have, the higher the risk for these pipeline plans," Kate Hardin, a Caspian Sea specialist with Cambridge Energy Research Associates in Massachusetts, said. "The important thing to remember, too, is that Russia remains a big competitor," she went on. "Right now, the majority of Russia's gas exports to Europe go through Ukraine and Russia is very interested in maintaining that monopoly. If Ukraine, Iran, and others do get serious about these additional gas pipelines into Europe, I think Russia would offer some competition. I would say Russia remains a major player in any of these plans."