Kazakhstan to help in Russian gas supplies to Uzbekistan
By Kamila Aliyeva
Moscow and Astana will support Uzbekistan in the delivery of oil to the republic through the territory of Kazakhstan.
"At the request of Uzbekistan, we will transport oil through Kazakhstan to Uzbek oil refinery," Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev told journalists following the talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin held within the framework of the EAEU summit.
To this end, a certain work should be conducted, he said noting that they "are ready to render such support to their friends."
Earlier, Uzbekistan expressed readiness to purchase up to 500,000 tons of oil from Russia for the refinery in the Jizzakh region.
The agreement on import oil supplies was reached during the visits of Uzbek President Shavkat Mirziyoyev to Kazakhstan and Russia.
At the end of April 2017, Uzbekistan started construction of a new refinery in Zafarobod district of the country’s Jizzakh region, which is expected to operate using the crude imported from Kazakhstan and Russia.
The refinery has design capacity of processing of five million tons of oil per year, production of 3.7 million tons of car fuel, over 700,000 tons of aviation fuel and 300,000 tons of associated oil products.
The cost of the project is $2.2 billion. It is scheduled to complete construction of the refinery in 2022.
The Jizzakh region is located in the central part of Uzbekistan and borders Kazakhstan in the north, and this will facilitate the construction of the oil pipeline. The two countries agreed to build the Shymkent-Jizzakh oil pipeline with a capacity of 5 million tons per year by 2021.
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Kamila Aliyeva is AzerNews’ staff journalist, follow her on Twitter: @Kami_Aliyeva
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