Kazakhstan’s crude oil shipments out of the Russian ports on the Black Sea continue uninterrupted after Vladimir Putin issued a decree requiring the Russian security service to authorize foreign ships to access Russia’s ports.
“As of today, shipments of Kazakh oil through the seaports of the Russian Federation have not been suspended,” the Kazakh Energy Ministry told Interfax.
Earlier this week, Putin signed a law that stipulates that foreign ships will require clearance from the FSB security service, the successor to the Cold War-era KGB, to access Russian ports.
Loading of Kazakhstan’s oil exports was briefly suspended, but FSB has started clearing foreign vessels to access ports, so they loadings have resumed, sources in the industry told Reuters on Thursday.
The Russian Black Sea ports are Kazakhstan’s main crude oil export outlet. Kazakhstan’s crude flows are not subject to Western sanctions despite the fact that they use Russian port infrastructure.
The Caspian Pipeline Consortium (CPC) operates the pipeline that transports oil from northwest Kazakhstan to Russia’s Black Sea port of Novorossiysk, a key hub for Kazakhstan’s oil exports.
The port of Novorossiysk handles most of Kazakhstan’s crude exports from giant oilfields in Kazakhstan operated by international oil firms, including U.S. supermajor Chevron.
Affiliates of Chevron and the other U.S. supermajor, ExxonMobil, are also minority shareholders in CPC, whose biggest shareholder is the Russian Federation with a 24% stake.
Meanwhile, non-OPEC producer Kazakhstan, which is boosting its oil output in defiance of its quotas in the OPEC+ deal, doesn’t plan to leave the alliance of producers, the country’s top officials said last week.
Kazakhstan is not considering leaving the OPEC+ pact as it believes it helps stabilize the oil market, Prime Minister Olzhas Bektenov said, as quoted by Russian news agency Interfax.
“We will do our best to fulfill our obligations, but we’ll take into account national interests,” the prime minister was quoted as saying.
By Tsvetana Paraskova for Oilprice.com
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