MOSCOW, Feb. 4 (UPI) -- News bulletins on Russia's state-owned television network RTR Monday say the country may be on the way to supplanting Saudi Arabia as the main supplier of oil to the United States.
Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Kasyanov, in Washington for talks with President Bush, did not dismiss such a scenario following a series of meetings with top Bush administration officials and leading U.S. businessmen.
In a live satellite linkup with RTR, Kasyanov said the relationship between Russia and the United States would be "intensified," and stressed that "closer ties will further improve international economic stability."
The Russian prime minister told the Interfax news agency that Russia was prepared to take a greater share of the world oil market once the U.S. and European economies begin expanding again.
"The removal of the curbs (on oil exports) could become essential if the U.S. economy and that of European countries start to grow simultaneously," Kasyanov said, adding optimistically that it would then "be possible to begin achieving Russia's strategic aim of increasing oil exports on the world market."
In December, Russia had grudgingly agreed to cut oil exports by 150,000 barrels a day to support the world price of crude, but on Sunday Kasyanov was reported saying that Moscow had made "no commitment" to the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries to continue with the temporary export cutback.
The Russian government, which relies on profits from oil exports for a significant proportion of budget revenues, has come under pressure from giant Russian oil producers such as Yukos to relax the cutbacks made under pressure from OPEC at the end of last year.
Should Russia withdraw from the voluntary cutback agreement, it would rapidly gain market share from Persian Gulf oil producers such as Saudi Arabia, which finds it can no longer dictate oil prices on the world market. Russia is currently the world's second-largest oil exporter after Saudi Arabia.
Kasyanov told RTR that "a significant shift (in the investment climate) could come in the shortest time."
The Russian premier said U.S. oil giant ExxonMobil had recently invested $15 billion in the Sakhalin-1 project in the Russian Far East, and that the chairman of Royal Dutch/Shell had told him that approval of a $10 billion investment by that company in the Sakhalin-2 project could be expected "in the near future."
"U.S. investors are ready, I hear this at meetings with leading businessmen," Kasyanov said.
