Russia will see that YUKOS oil company's contracts with China are honoured despite over $7 billion in back-tax claims against the country's largest oil exporter, UK newspaper The Business said on Sunday.
"Oil products will keep going to China the way they have been," The Business quoted Prime Minister Mikhail Fradkov as saying. Before YUKOS came under attack from the authorities, seen as retribution for its founder Mikhail Khodorkovsky's political ambitions, the oil company sought greater access to Chinese markets and promoted the construction of a new pipeline.
YUKOS has said the tax claim is threatening output and exports.
Russia's state railways corporation said in mid-August that China would finance transportation of YUKOS oil if the oil major was unable to pay by itself.