Ukrainian pipeline operator Ukrtransnafta extended its oil transit deal with Russia’s Transneft by 10 years, Ukrtransnafta announced on Tuesday. Ukrtransnafta CEO Mykola Gavrilenko and Transneft Vice-President Sergey Andronov signed a contract for transit on Tuesday in Zagreb covering the period from Jan. 1, 2020 until Jan. 1, 2030, the Ukrainian company announced in a statement.
The current contract expires at the end of this year and the basic principles of cooperation between Ukrtransnafta and Transneft remain unchanged for the new extended contract. In April, Belarus' state oil company Belneftekhim, one of the companies that receive oil via the Druzhba pipeline that carries Russian oil to Europe, halted oil transit because of the poor quality of its oil. Ukraine, Poland, Hungary, Slovakia, and Czechia followed suit and also halted oil intake.
On May 2, clean oil via the pipeline reached Belarus, however, the Belarusian oil company said the measures undertaken to upgrade the oil only allowed for the resumption of operations of one branch of the pipeline while asserting that a "full recovery would take several months of hard work.” The contamination impacted approximately 5 million tonnes of oil worth up to US$2.6 billion.
(Anadolu Agency)
