Ukrainian Refineries To Buy More Azeri Crude

The Kremenchuk Refinery is ready to increase its purchases of Azeri crude to 5 to 5.5 million tons in 2011, Ukrtatnafta CEO Pavel Ovcherenko said.

He added that the facility could increase processing from 240,000 to 400,000 tons per month. "This will be a contract under which will will increase the volume of supplies. the contract will be linked to the spot market – the spot will not differ from the contract", he said.

According to RBK-Ukraina, Ovcharenko said there would be no problem with increasing supplies since it made good logistical and therefore economic sense for Azerbaijan to sell crude to Ukraine.