27 December 2006
Minsk threatens to raise gas transit fee for Gazprom next year
Minsk will raise transit rates for Russian gas if Gazprom moves ahead with its plans to increase the price of gas supplied to Belarusian consumers on January 1, 2007, Deputy Prime Minister Vladimir Semashko warned.
If the price is set at $75 or $110 for 1,000 cubic meters, the Russian company will be charged $1.3 and $1.65, respectively, in transit fee per 1,000 cubic meters/100 kilometers for gas pipelined via Beltransgaz's network, the Belarusian official told reporters on December 26.
According to the deputy prime minister, a total of 44 billion cubic meters of gas is annually pipelined through Belarus' territory.
When asked to predict what would happen if Russia cut off gas supplies to the country on January 1, Mr. Semashko said that "gas can be shut off, but there would be enough gas for Lithuania and Poland only for 12 to 13 days." "Whatever happens, Belarus will have gas. We and Gazprom are interdependent," the official noted.
"Of course, they can carry out such experiments on Belarus but this won't give Gazprom any additional advantages," he went on to say.
Gazprom currently pays Belarus $0.75 per 1,000 cubic meters/100 kilometers in transit fee, a rate which is even lower than fees charged in Russia, official information sources said. Ukraine charges Gazprom $1.6 per 1,000 cubic meters/100 kilometers, Poland, $2.5 and other countries, $3.5.
Gazprom annually saves $882 million in transit fees by pipelining gas to Western customers through Belarus, Mr. Semashko said. The amount can grow to $1.2 billion if the Russian giant goes ahead with its plans to raise the amount of gas transited via Belarus to 61 billion cubic meters, he added. "Although the Russian company is trying to convince everyone that it does not need this pipeline that much," the official noted. //BelaPAN
http://brestonline.com/en/news/news764.html