Azernews.Az

KIEV – Ukraine and Belarus have signed the first in a series of agreements needed to start the transit of Venezuelan crude oil to Belarus through Ukrainian pipelines, Ukraine's fuel minister said on Thursday, Reuters reported.

Ukrainian officials said this month the first trial shipment of 80,000 tonnes of Venezuelan crude oil to Belarus would be made in November.

Belarus already imports Venezuelan Santa Barbara oil via Ukrainian Black Sea port of Odessa and Ukrainian railways but wants to use the much cheaper Odessa-Brody and Druzhba pipelines.

"We have signed the first document which regulates the work of Odessa-Brody oil pipeline. This will be long-term cooperation," minister Yuri Boiko told reporters.

During a visit to Minsk this month, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez agreed to supply the former Soviet republic with 30 million tonnes of oil over three years from 2011 in a deal worth as much as $19.4 billion.

Venezuela's oil minister, Rafael Ramirez, said on Wednesday his country would boost crude oil exports to Belarus by 150 percent next year to 200,000 barrels per day and was getting a good price for the deal.

Ukraine's Odessa-Brody pipeline, originally built to supply Caspian oil to Europe, is working in reverse mode due to the lack of Caspian oil, but Kiev said the situation must be changed.

"All our further efforts will be directed towards filling Odessa-Brody and launching it in the direct mode," Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovich said at a joint news conference with Azeri President Ilham Aliyev on Thursday.

Yanukovich said Kiev was looking at Baku as a crude oil supplier to Ukraine. Aliyev said Azerbaijan had exported about 1.0 million tonnes of its crude oil to Ukraine so far this year and planned to boost supplies in the future.