MOSCOW, June 17 (RIA Novosti) - Russia will not start
natural gas deliveries to China in 2011 as planned, because the
parties have yet to agree on the price, a senior Gazprom
executive said on Wednesday.
Moscow and Beijing reached an agreement in March 2006 on
starting Russian natural gas supplies from West and Northeast
Siberia to China in 2011 under the Altai project.
"Talks are ongoing. No price agreement has been reached
yet, there can be no talk of 2011," Alexander Avanenkov said.
"As soon as there is a price, we will start the
construction, but this is a complicated issue," he added.
Another top Gazprom official, deputy CEO Alexander
Medvedev, signaled last November that a price agreement was
needed between Russia and China to implement the Altai project.
Construction of the $11 billion pipeline was scheduled to
begin in 2008. The pipeline is intended to supply 30-40 billion
cubic meters of natural gas to China annually.
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