MINSK (Sputnik) — Belarus and Russia have reached an agreement that envisions Moscow restoring oil supplies to Minsk in exchange for lifted transit tariff hikes, Belarusian Deputy Prime Minister Vladimir Semashko said Monday.
"Half of the supplies to Belarus have been blocked in the third quarter. We should have received 6 million tonnes, but receive only 3 million tonnes currently. Everything is being restored now," Semashko said as quoted by the Belarusian Telegraph Agency (BelTA).
The statement confirms Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko's earlier remarks that the settlement has been reached on Sunday. Semashko added that full oil supplies should be restored by October 20.
"We have also made conciliatory moves. Transit tariffs have been raised recently. We are returning it to those rates that were in effect as of October 1," the deputy prime minister said.
Belarus faces decline in oil deliveries from Russia. Russian Energy Minister Alexander Novak said that the decrease in deliveries was linked to Minsk's gas debt and shortfall of petrochemicals' deliveries to Russia. Russian Deputy Prime Minister Arkady Dvorkovich said that the level of deliveries could be restored if Moscow and Minsk reached an agreement on the gas debt.
Moscow and Minsk have been locked in talks over the price of Russian gas supplied to Belarusian consumers. In July, Novak said that Belarus owed $270 million in unpaid gas bills to Russia.
Minsk has been refusing to recognize the debt, saying that the price of $132.77 per 1,000 cubic meters of gas demanded by Moscow is unfair. Russia has stressed that payments must be made in line with the contract.
