RE-ROUTING EUROPE’S OIL: Russia May Ship Oil Around Belarus

A bitter New Year’s spat between Russia and Belarus over the transit of oil saw deliveries to Europe cut for days. Now Moscow is threatening to bypass Belarus completely, in its latest move to show its neighbors who is energy boss.

Moscow has begun “intensive consultations with Transneft,” its state-controlled oil monopoly, about sending oil around Belarus and into tankers on the Baltic Sea, Russian Deputy Trade and Economic Development Minister Andrei Sharonov told the Berliner Zeitung on Tuesday. “The debate now is whether to divert oil (for Europe) to the Russian port of Primorsk,” he said. “There is that possibility.”
Der Spiegel