BELARUS NEWS AND ANALYSIS

DATE:

10/01/2007

Russia to diversify oil export routes

MOSCOW, January 10 (Itar-Tass) -- Russia will diversify its oil supply routes in order to avoid incidents similar to that with Belarus, Deputy Economic Development and Trade Minister Andrei Sharonov said.

"This event once again showed that Russia is heavily dependent on transit schemes for oil supplies to Europe," Sharonov said on Wednesday.

To diversify its oil export routes, Russia will build a pipeline from Eastern Siberia to the Pacific.

Sharonov said that if this pipeline was operating now, no suspension of oil production would have been possible.

Then Russia will increase the capacity of the Primorsk seaport and double the amount of oil transported to the port by pipelines. It also plans to increase the capacity of ports on the Black Sea and the North Sea.

"This will allow us to reduce the heavy dependence of Russia on land routes," the official said.

Meanwhile, Russia and Belarus have resumed talks on bilateral trade relations in Moscow.

Economic Development and Trade Minister German Gref leads the Russian delegation to the talks. The Belarusian delegation is headed by Vice Prime Minister Andrei Kobyakov.

"The talks will cover the entire agenda of trade relations," Sharonov said.

He said earlier that the question of cutting oil production in Russia will become irrelevant if, by the end of Wednesday, Russia and Belarus resume talks on Russian oil transit by the Druzhba pipeline through Belarus.

"If we resume the talks before the end of the day, the question of extraction cuts will be removed [from the agenda]," the Prime-Tass news agency quoted Sharonov as saying.

He said this issue was quite painless for Russian companies and expressed hope that it would b resolved.

Asked about the damage sustained by Russian companies from the conflict with Belarus, Sharonov said it was not possible to assess the damage for the time being because no relevant information had come from oil companies yet.

Source:

http://www.itar-tass.com/eng/level2.html?NewsID=11145503&PageNum=0

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