Reports: Minsk demands $1.5bn compensation from Moscow

The Russian business newspaper Vedomosti reported the news quoting three federal officials without revealing their names. There are no decisions at the moment.  A Belarusian official said: “We have agreed to calculate the losses together and decide what needs to be done about it.”

The 3-year manoeuvre is lowering the customs fee for oil and increasing the tax imposed on the extraction of mineral resources.  The internal oil price will increase which will affect oil processing both in Russia and Belarus. The Belarusian refineries buy Russian oil at the internal prices and Belarus pays the customs fee made on the export of oil products to Russia to compensate for it.

Belarus may lose $250 million in 2015, 300 million - in 2016 and 370 million – in 2017. However, these are not the final numbers as Belarus has not finished the calculation yet.  Representatives of the Russian Ministry of Finance and Ministry of Energy are not commenting on Minsk’s suggestions, the edition notes.

Belarus has suggested lowering the customs fee for oil product export that is paid to Russia (as a compensation for buying oil at the internal price). Alyaksandr Lukashenka said that it was about $4 billion. The sum will be decreased by #1.5 billion next year. Belarus wants to decrease it by another 1 or 1.5 billion dollars.

By the way, Russian experts think that Belarus’ subsidies received from Russia at the cost of oil and gas totalled $10 billion last year.

Photo: Fotolia