Russian pipeline monopoly rejects new oil transportation fees

Russia’s oil pipeline monopoly Transneft has refused to accept new oil transportation fees set by the Belarusian government.

Igor Dyomin, an advisor to the Transneft president, said on Tuesday that the company had refused to sign an agreement with a Belarusian pipeline operator providing for the new fees as Belarus had failed to discuss them with Russia in advance, according to media reports.

Earlier in the day, Mr. Dyomin told Russia’s Tass news agency that Transneft had already notified Russian oil companies of the coming increase in the transportation fees. He added that Transneft worked to have the fee hike abolished.

Belarus’ ministry of anti-monopoly regulation and trade and the Russian government were said to be in talks over the new fees. “Consultations are being conducted with the Russian side at the level of the ministry’s leadership,” Tass quoted Alina Hilevich, spokeswoman for the Belarusian ministry, as saying. “Representatives of the ministry will give their comment after they are over.”

In late September, the Belarusian government issued a directive ordering that the fee for the pipeline transportation of Russian crude oil through the territory of Belarus be raised by 50 percent on October 11.

Under the directive, the fee is to increase from 267.32 to 400.98 Russian rubles per ton for the pipeline route from Russia’s Unecha to Poland’s Adamowo-Zastawa, from 114.82 to 172.23 Russian rubles for the route from Unecha to Ukraine’s Brody, and from 32.31 to 48.47 rubles for the route from Russia’s Nevel to Vysokoye, a Belarusian city at the Polish border.
Russia annually exports tens of millions of tons of oil via Belarus through the southern and northern branches of its Druzhba pipeline. The oil goes to Poland, Germany, Hungary, Slovakia, the Czech Republic, and Ukraine.

The government gave no explanation for the sharp increase in the fees, which is widely seen as the latest move in a months-long energy row between Minsk and Moscow.

Russia cut oil exports to Belarus by some 40 percent in July, August and September in an apparent response to Belarus’ unilateral decision to pay for Russian gas at a price of $73 for 1,000 cubic meters earlier this year, or roughly just half of what Russia insisted on.