Russia refused to offer 30 to 40% discount on crude oil as sought by a delegation from Pakistan lead by state Minister for petroleum, Musadik Malik, claiming that all volumes were committed.
A delegation from Pakistan, including State Minister for petroleum, Musadik Malik, Capt (R) Muhammad Mehmood, Additional secretary in-charge for petroleum and other senior officials left for Moscow earlier this week to negotiate about a deal on the import of discounted fuel.
So far, the talks haven’t been proven successful and ended without any conclusion. However, Russia assured that they will keep Pakistan’s demand into consideration and will share the response through diplomatic channels. The point to mention here is that Russian oil is cheaper than global oil prices and Pakistani oil refineries have the capacity to process the Russian crude oil as one of the private oil refineries has already produced fine products from Russian crude oil in past.
Read More: Pakistani delegation leaves for Russia for cheaper crude oil
Moreover, Russia asked Pakistan to fulfil its commitment about the Pakistan Stream Gas Pipeline, which will be built from Karachi to Lahore. During the talks the delegation shared the desire to alter the PSGP model to which Russian side responded by saying that the model under the GTG structure has already been established and only a few provision of the shareholding agreement is needed to be finalized.
The point of significance is that currently Pakistan has no long term plan to curb the fuel shortage and spare supply is rapidly decreasing due to increased demand in the Market. At this time any deal with Moscow would relieve the pressure on the country’s forex reserve and billions of rupees could be saved.
