Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin officially launched on Monday the East-Siberia - Pacific Ocean oil pipeline during his visit to the region.

The Russian premier also visited the specialized maritime oil-loading port of Kozmino, the final point of the ESPO project, where he gave the start to pumping the first batch of Siberian oil into an oil tanker.

The ESPO project is designed to pump up to 1.6 million barrels (220,000 tons) of crude per day from Siberia to Russia's Far East and then on to China and the Asia-Pacific region

The project's first leg envisages the construction of a 2,757-kilometer (1,713-mile) section with a capacity of 30 million tons (220.5 million barrels) of oil per year. It will link Taishet, in East Siberia's Irkutsk Region, to Skovorodino, in the Amur Region, in Russia's Far East.

The second stretch will run 2,100 kilometers (1,300 miles) from Skovorodino to the Pacific Ocean. It will pump 367.5 million barrels of oil annually.

KOZMINO (Far East), December 28 (RIA Novosti)