KEY POINTS:
MINSK - Belarus President Alexander Lukashenko on Friday threatened new duties on transit of Russian oil across the country's territory, about two weeks after a dispute between Moscow and Minsk halted oil exports to Europe.
Since the dispute was resolved, Lukashenko has repeatedly spoken of retaliating or seeking some recompense from Moscow.
Lukashenko was quoted by state BelTA news agency as saying Russian oil companies delivered oil to Belarussian oil refineries at prices higher than on world markets and said contracts for February had not yet been signed.
"Those companies which will offer such contracts at such prices here in Belarus to ship oil to Europe will be subject to additional duties. We should compensate our losses," Lukashenko said.
"We will not argue with them. It is their oil. But we will ship oil without losses for us."
Russia cut oil flows through the "Friendship" (Druzhba) pipeline for three days in early January after Moscow said Belarus had been siphoning off oil illegally from the pipeline, which supplies Europe with a 10th of its oil.
- REUTERS
