Public joint-stock company Ukrtransnafta has made arrangements with public joint-stock company Ukrtatnafta (Kremenchuk oil refinery) on the transshipment of Urals crude oil pumped from the Odesa-Kremenchuk oil pipeline to railway tankers to transport it and pump it to the second line of the Druzhba oil pipeline, First Deputy Director General of Ukrtransnafta Andriy Pasichnyk has told Interfax-Ukraine.

"On January 3 we signed a contract on transshipment of Urals oil from the Odesa-Kremenchuk section with Ukrtatnafta. Crude oil will be transported by rail to Brody and then oil will fill in the second line of the Druzhba oil pipeline [now it is filled with preservative agents]. We seek to remove Urals oil in January and start pumping Azeri Light crude oil to Kremenchuk oil refinery from February. Urals crude oil is replaced to Azeri Light in pursuant to the contracts signed with Ukrtatnafta to transport at least 1.3 million tonnes of Azeri Light crude oil to Kremenchuk oil refinery starting from 2017," he said.

Pasichnyk said that the contract has guarantees: if transportation volumes fall, Kremenchuk oil refinery would compensate all expenses on the replacement of Urals oil to Azeri Light to Ukrtransnafta.

The contract to transport at least 1.3 million tonnes of Azeri Light oil to Kremenchuk oil refinery was approved by Naftogaz Ukrainy in December.

The Odesa-Kremenchuk oil pipeline was idle for around five years.