Deputy PM says oil spilt in Novorossiysk on lack of port repairs

MOSCOW, Aug 24 (PRIME) -- The main reason behind an oil spill near Novorossiysk was the lack of repairs at the key facilities, Deputy Prime Minister Viktoria Abramchenko said on Tuesday.

"Long-term use without capital repairs of the buildings was the main reason of what has happened. This year we have changed the contractor, we did it in March. The former contractor, the one who used the infrastructure, did not invest in it," Abramchenko told reporters.

The spill happened on August 7 while oil was pumped to Greek oil tanker Minerva Symphony by the first single-point buoy mooring unit of Caspian Pipeline Consortium. The company said then that only 12 cubic meters of oil were spilled, and that the spill area is only 200 square meters.

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