MOSCOW, February 27. /TASS/. Transneft is not transporting oil towards Poland at the moment, the company’s spokesman Igor Dyomin told TASS, adding that oil should have been pumped to Polish refineries in late February, but routing orders with payment were not processed.
"Transneft transports oil to other countries on the basis of the export schedule approved by the Russian Energy Ministry, as well as routing orders processed by freight forwarders. Pumping to Polish refineries was scheduled for the third ten-day interval of February. However, routing orders with confirmed resource and transit payments were not processed. Moreover, changes in the schedule ruled out deliveries to Polish consumers. Because of this, oil is not being transported towards Poland by Transneft," he said.
On February 25, Poland’s largest refining company Orlen said that Russian oil supplies via Druzhba to the country had stopped. According to its CEO Daniel Obajtek, only 10% of oil was supplied from Russia.
Orlen's present contract with Tatneft, which was concluded for 200,000 tons of oil per month, expires in December 2024. Russian oil is supplied to Orlen through pipelines. Warsaw refused to purchase oil from Russia by sea after the onset of the special military operation in Ukraine. Poland intends to replace Russian oil with crude from the US, the regions of the Persian Gulf and the North Sea.
Earlier, Transneft said that Poland continued purchasing Russian oil flowing via the Druzhba main pipeline in January. Chief Executive Officer Nikolay Tokarev said last December that the company had received requests from Poland for oil pumping in December and Q1 2023 despite reports of Poland’s reluctance to continue supplies.