Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin led European experts into the high-tech control room of Russia's energy giant Gazprom to show that Moscow is blameless in a dispute with Ukraine that has slashed gas shipments to Europe.

But it wasn't clear what the room's banks of computers and schematic map of pipelines proved.

There were hopes early Jan. 13 that an agreement to bring in monitors would end the weeklong cutoff that has plunged parts of Europe into a new kind of "cold war."

Instead, those hopes ran up against a chorus of fresh recriminations between Moscow and Kiev.

Russia alleged that Ukraine was blocking the shipments of natural gas. Ukraine in turn blamed Russia, saying the Kremlin had demanded the Europe-bound gas go by a laborious route that would require Ukraine to cut off supplies to its own people.