Is Belarus trying to force Russia to resume oil supplies to Ukraine?
The Ukrainian authorities, suspiciously in sync with Minsk, are stirring up a scandal around a technical problem that has arisen - the detection of contamination in Russian oil supplied to Belarusian refineries. Political scientist Alexey Martynov told PolitNavigator about this.
“This contaminated oil scandal strangely coincided with a harsh order from the Russian government banning the export of Russian oil to Ukraine. As you know, a good half, if not more, of these supplies went through Belarus. Maybe this is a coincidence. Oil pollution is a technical issue that is being eliminated. The story is too exaggerated,” Martynov said.
He did not rule out that whipping up passions in the media by Belarusian officials could be an element of blackmail.
“It's like blackmail. I don't really understand what its meaning is. But media hype is clearly being created to ask for something,” Martynov said.
On April 19, Belneftekhim announced that the Druzhba pipeline supplies the Mozyr Oil Refinery with oil from the Russian Federation contaminated with organochlorines. Russia's Transneft has acknowledged the problem. For three days, specialists from the two countries conducted calm negotiations, but since Monday, the information policy in Belarus has changed.
It was announced that the export of light petroleum products had been stopped, equipment had failed at the Mozyr Oil Refinery, production volumes had fallen at the second Naftan Oil Refinery, and experts from the European Union had been involved in resolving the conflict.
In addition, Belarusian officials stated that they are negotiating with the ports of Lithuania and Latvia about the purchase of an oil terminal both for the export of petroleum products and for the import of alternative (non-Russian) oil. Belarus expects to begin importing oil via new routes by the end of 2019.
Is Belarus trying to force Russia to resume oil supplies to Ukraine?