2010-09-27 16:46

BEIJING - Chinese President Hu Jintao and his Russian counterpart, Dmitry Medvedev, attended a ceremony in Beijing Monday to mark the completion of the China-Russia crude oil pipeline.

"The smooth completion of the pipeline project is a model for the two countries' mutually beneficial win-win cooperation and a milestone for China-Russia energy cooperation," Hu said.

The ceremony came after the two held talks, during which Hu said the two sides should strive to ensure safe operation of the project.

Medvedev said the pipeline will help create closer ties between the two countries.

Representatives of China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC) in the northeast Chinese city of Daqing and representatives of Russian oil pipeline giant Transneft in the Russian town of Skovorodino reported the completion of the project via a live video-audio broadcast during the ceremony at the Great Hall of the People.

Construction of the 999-kilometer pipeline began last year. Some 927 kilometers of the pipeline is in China while 72 kilometers of it is in Russia.

The pipeline starts in the Russian town of Skovorodino in the far-eastern Amur region and enters China at Mohe county before continuing to Daqing, a petrochemicals hub in northeastern China.

The pipeline is part of a bilateral loan-for-oil deal reached in February 2009 between the two countries. Under the deal, China makes a $25-billion-long-term loan to Russia while Russia supplies China with 300 million tons of oil through pipelines from 2011 until 2030.