Russia blames China’s ‘absurd conditions’ for loan package
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  • Russia and China suspended talks on the construction of a new Siberian oil pipeline on November 12. The Russian state pipeline monopoly, Transneft and oil production company, Rosneft blamed China for insisting on "absurd conditions" to execute the $25 billion loan package, being negotiated in exchange for importing oil. Sources noted that China's state oil company CNPC had asked for higher rates of interest owing to the recent freeze in lending following the financial crisis.

    Transneft and CNPC had signed a long-awaited deal at the end of October during a visit to Moscow by Chinese Prime Minister Wen Jiabao. The pipeline would have run from the East Siberia-Pacific Ocean trunk pipeline, still under construction, to the Chinese border. Its capacity was expected to be about 15 million tonnes per year. The branch pipeline was planned to run some 70 kilometres (45 miles) from Skovorodino in Siberia to the Chinese border and was to eventually supply the oil hub of Daqing in northern China1.

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