The Ukrainian Higher Economic Court has upheld lower court decisions on recognizing Ukraine's ownership of sections of the Samara-Western Direction and Grozny-Armavir-Trudova oil product pipelines on Ukrainian territory, whose overall length amounts to 1,433 kilometers, the Ukrainian Prosecutor General's Office reported on Tuesday.

The court of original jurisdiction and then an appeals court fully granted a prosecutor's lawsuit on returning the Ukrainian sections of the said oil product pipelines earlier belonging to PrykarpatZakhidTrans controlled by Russia's Transneft to government ownership, it said.

"At the same time, PrykarpatZakhidTrans and a number of Russian joint stock companies, not ceding attempts to retain the oil product pipeline in their ownership, appealed the court rulings with the Ukrainian Higher Economic Court. A cassation court that considered the case on March 17, 2015, agreed with the prosecutor's arguments and left the court rulings unchanged," it said.

The trunk oil product pipeline was built in Soviet times as a strategic facility and has been Ukraine's property since August 24, 1991; however, it has been operated by PrykarpatZakhidTrans controlled by Russia's Transneft, the Prosecutor General's Office said.

It was reported earlier that the Rivne Regional Economic Court had granted the Prosecutor General's Office suit in 2011, declaring the government's ownership of the Ukrainian sections of the Samara-Western Direction and Grozny-Armavir-Trudova oil product pipelines whose overall length amounts to 1,433 kilometers and which earlier belonged to PrykarpatZakhidTrans controlled by Russia's Transneft. PrykarpatZakhidTrans appealed the ruling.

Transneft warned on April 23, 2014 that it could suspend the operations of the oil product pipeline in Ukrainian territory.

PrykarpatZakhidTrans annually pumps 1.7 million tonnes of oil products through its pipeline system, which includes both transit and shipments to the domestic