A contract for gas deliveries via Western route may be signed during President Putin’s visit to China in September, if all the details are finalized by that time.
“If everything is ready, the visit will certainly become a good pretext for striking this deal,” Peskov said.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov called attention to the fact that the presidential administration has never used the practice of intentionally using foreign visits as a pretext for signing documents. “If the sides manage to reach any agreements, then the visit may naturally be used as a floor for signing some documents,” the Kremlin spokesman said.
Russia and China are planning to build a gas pipeline system via the western and eastern routes.
The 2,700-kilometer-long western route envisages the supply of 30 billion cubic meters of natural gas to China annually from gas deposits in West Siberia.
The eastern route stipulates the supply of 38 billion cubic meters of natural gas to China annually from gas deposits in Yakutia in northeast Russia and the Irkutsk Region in East Siberia via the Power of Siberia gas pipeline.
The western route, called Power of Siberia-2, is intended to run across the highly mountainous area of the Altai region in West Siberia to China.
On May 8, 2015 Russia and China signed a framework agreement on the main terms of gas deliveries via the western route.