Belarus switches oil products to Russian from EU ports

MOSCOW: Russia and Belarus signed a three-year agreement on Friday to re-direct Belarusian oil products to Russian ports, bypassing EU members Estonia and Lithuania, in retaliation after the Baltic states imposed sanctions on top officials in Minsk.

The deal is part of a show of support for Minsk from Moscow following last year's presidential election, which Alexander Lukashenko said he won but opposition parties in Belarus said was rigged.

The three Baltic nations imposed sanctions on Lukashenko and his allies following the elections and he promised to re-route oil products shipments to Russian ports in retaliation.

Russian Transport Minister Vitaly Saveliev said on Friday the country's ports were capable of handling 9.8 million tonnes of Belarusian oil products over a three-year period, including 2 million tonnes this year.

Shipments, set to start from March, would rise to 3.2 million tonnes next year and stay at 3.1 million tonnes in 2023, Saveliev said at the signing ceremony, adding that the deal would be automatically reviewed once it expires.

Belarus transport minister Aleksei Avramenko said at the signing ceremony that the economic terms for shipments via EU and Russian ports were equal and called Friday's deal "mutually beneficial" for Moscow and Minsk.

Last year, Moscow provided Minsk with a $1.5 billion loan to stabilise its finances as protests spurred cash withdrawals and an increased demand for foreign currency.

Klaipedos Nafta, an oil terminal operator at Lithuania's Klaipeda port, said on Jan 19 it had not received any orders to ship oil products from Belarus since they were suspended in December.

Oil products from Belarus accounted for about a quarter of the terminal's export cargo in 2019 and 2020, and the terminal has cut some investment projects and expenses since losing them.

The port of Klaipeda handled 46.3 tonnes of cargo in 2019, of which 1.3 tonnes were oil products from Belarus.