KazTransOil, a subsidiary of Kazakhstan’s national company KazMunayGas, has begun the transit of Russian oil to China along the Omsk-Pavlodar- Atasu-Alashankou route. Kazakh pipelines will transport 101,100 tonnes of Russian crude this January, including 51,100 tonnes from TNK-BP and 50,000 tonnes from Gazprom Neft. The transit will stand at 300,000 tonnes in the first quarter of this year. “KazTransOil will transport the rest of the planned amount in February-March 2008. The transit will be distributed equally each month,” the company said. The annual exports of up to five million tonnes of Russian crude to China via Kazakhstan result from the mutual transit agreement Russia and Kazakhstan signed in late November. No transit schedules were made earlier. Meanwhile, Interfax quoted a source as saying two weeks ago that KazTransOil would not allow Gazprom Neft to transport crude through Kazakhstan. A representative of Gazprom Neft confirmed the information and said that his company was ready to start the supplies on December 26, 2007. “Gazprom Neft will apply for transportation of 360,000 tonnes of crude in the second quarter of this year,” he said. KazTransOil operates trunk pipelines with a total length of 5,215 kilometres and water mains with a length of 2,175 kilometres. The total size of the company’s storage reservoirs is 1.3 million cubic metres, including 1.15 million of crude storage reservoirs.