First Deputy Prime Minister of Belarus Dzmitry Krutoy has commented on the results of the talks in Sochi, held on February 7 between Alyaksandr Lukashenka and Vladimir Putin, BelTA reports.
According to Krutoy, Belarusian refineries will buy oil from Russian companies at world market prices. This is exactly what the Belarusian side insisted on, said First Deputy Prime Minister.
“Belarus does not need any special exclusive conditions. We want to buy oil at world quotations, and no worse,” he said and added that the Russian President promised to help the Belarusian refineries to negotiate with the Russian producers.
Krutoy stressed that about 100 million tons of oil is produced and supplied by small companies in Russia. But Belarus has been working for many years mainly with big companies such as Rosneft, Lukoil, Tatneft and others. From next week, the Belarusian side plans to start working with both small and large companies.
First Deputy Prime Minister also said that now “any company, which will be profitable and interesting to work with our refineries, will be allowed to pipe, transit, supply through Transneft as an agent”. This, he said, should increase the interest of Russian companies in Belarus.
“We expect (this is a big breakthrough of our current agreements) that soon this oil problem will be completely solved,” summed up Krutoy.
The price of natural gas may go down
As for natural gas, its price for Belarus is $ 127 per 1 thousand cubic meters to be delivered in March-December 2020 is defined as a basic option, said First Deputy Prime Minister. He notes that the relevant ministers, along with Gazprom, will continue negotiations in the coming weeks. As a result, the price may slightly change “in our favor.
Negotiations on the price for 2021 have not yet been conducted.
Belarus asks to change the terms of the loan for BelNPP
In addition, said Krutoy, the governments of Belarus and Russia will discuss the terms of the loan for BelNPP construction, “taking into account a certain shift of terms”. In particular, Minsk is asking to postpone the start of payments on the loan, as well as “to extend the term of this loan and slightly reduce the interest rate, bringing it in line with those contracts existing in other countries of Rosatom”.
According to him, BelNPP should be the safest station, so “there should be no rush here,” “everything should be very carefully checked”.
