Sechin: Russia expects money rather than stocks for gas

Belarus’s gas debt to Russia can only be paid by cash and not by stocks. According to RIA Novosti, the Russian vice Prime Minister Igor Sechin has claimed it. Alyaksandr Lukashenka’s statement that he was ready to discuss the possibility of selling the control stock of “Beltransgaz” to Russia was accepted as a possible pattern of paying off the debt ($192 million) for the gas supplied in 2010.

Sechin has also claimed that Russia did not see any reason to cancel oil export duties for Belarus. According to him, oil duties for Belarus can only be cancelled in the framework of creation of a Single Economic Space.