By Lidia Kelly
MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russia, which is pressing Ukraine to repay a $3 billion eurobond soon, said on Friday it was worried about proposed reforms to the International Monetary Fund's lending rules aimed at helping Ukraine even if it misses repayment to Moscow in December.
Russia's finance minister told journalists that policy changes by the Washington-based Fund were being forced through over the "very politicised" issue of Ukraine's debt restructuring.
The IMF said on Thursday it would soon consider changes to lending rules that may allow continued support for the cash-strapped ex-Soviet republic if it missed payments on its debt to Russia, while keeping up pressure on the countries to break the impasse.
Ukraine has reached agreement with private creditors to restructure its sovereign and sovereign-guaranteed debt to plug a $15 billion funding gap under an IMF-led $40 billion bailout programme.
But Russia, which is involved in confrontation with Ukraine over annexation of its Crimean peninsula and support for separatist rebels in the east, says the $3 billion it is owed is country-to-country official debt outside the scope of Kiev's deal with private creditors.
Moscow wants the two-year eurobond, taken out by the government of pro-Moscow ex-president Viktor Yanukovich only two months before he was ousted by street protests in February 2014, to be fully repaid in December.
An IMF spokesman said on Thursday the Fund's board was expected to debate in the "near future" a possible change allowing the IMF to keep supporting countries if they fail to repay official creditors, or sovereign states.
Finance Minister Anton Siluanov said on Friday that Kiev had refused to consider any alternatives apart from equating Ukraine's debt to Russia with debt before private creditors.
He added that the "haste" of the IMF to discuss lending changes was not accidental.
"Russia does not want Ukraine to be left without financial support in a difficult situation," Siluanov told journalists.
"However, we are concerned that the changes in the policy of the Fund are forced in the context of a very politicized issue of restructuring of the Ukrainian debt."
Russian President Vladimir Putin said earlier this month the IMF should lend Ukraine the $3 billion to pay off Russia
(Additional reporting by Daria Korsunskaya; Writing by Lidia Kelly and Alexander Winning; Editing by Richard Balmforth)
