Negotiations on possible deliveries of Azerbaijani oil to Belarus will be continued at the level of the Belneftekhim Concern and SOCAR (State Oil Company of Azerbaijan), the Concern's press secretary Marina Kostuchenko told Trend in a telephone conversation. According to her, work in this direction will be continued at the level of state-owned enterprises of the two countries.
Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko proposed that Azerbaijan deliver oil to the country through a "swap" scheme. He voiced the proposal at a meeting with State Oil Company of the Azerbaijan Republic (SOCAR) President, Rovnag Abdullayev.
"I think if we agree (on the delivery of Azerbaijani oil to Belarusian refineries) and, above all, on this 'swap' scheme, then you would get $10 per ton. We would also win. I think it would be the right move," Lukashenko said.
The issue concerns transporting Azerbaijani oil to Belarusian refineries via the Odessa-Brody Pipeline to the Druzhba Pipeline and then on to Belarusian refineries. The oil would replace the oil that Belarus currently buys from Venezuela. The sides would save on transport costs, Lukashenko said.
The Odessa-Brody oil transportation project sought to diversify oil supplies to Ukrainian refineries and develop the country's transit potential. The construction of the pipeline was completed in May 2002. Its trunk has a length of 674 kilometers, with a pipe diameter of 1,020 millimeters. The capacity of the pipeline and the terminal is 9-14 million tons per year during the first stage.
Over the two years since the pipeline's construction, Ukraine has unsuccessfully negotiated the transportation of Caspian oil in the forward direction. As the country was unable to receive any concrete proposals from companies, the Ukrainian government authorized the use of pipeline for transporting Russian oil in the reverse direction in late June 2004.
