Belarus has made an advance payment for 1.126 metric tons of Russian oil for January, a spokesman for Belarusian petrochemical company Belneftekhim said on Friday.

“We have received the confirmation that oil companies have already received advance payments for 1.26 million metric tons of [Russian] oil,” the Belneftekhim spokesman said.

He said a Russian oil delivery schedule envisaged supplying 1.55 million metric tons of oil in Belarus in January 2010.

However, Belarus and Russia failed to agree on oil supply terms for 2010 at Moscow talks on Thursday evening.

Russian Deputy Prime Minister Igor Sechin said in December Russia had offered duty-free oil supplies to its “fraternal” neighbor Belarus. Duty-free supplies are available for Belarusian domestic consumption only and stand at 5-6 million metric tons annually.

Sechin said up to 21 million metric tons of oil had been exported to Belarus via pipelines and another 4-5 million metric tons by rail and trucks in 2009.

Like Ukraine, Belarus is a major transit route for oil pumped to Eastern Europe via the Druzhba pipeline.

MINSK, January 1 (RIA Novosti)