"SOCAR resumed oil shipments through the Baku-Novorossiisk pipeline this month, which were halted in the beginning of June," Rovnag Abdullayev told reporters.

It's not immediately clear why oil flows were halted.

Azerbaijan's SOCAR shipped 678,046 tonnes of oil via Russia in the first half of 2015, up from 508,222 tonnes in the same period last year.

SOCAR said in January it had signed a one-year contract with Russian oil pipeline operator Transneft to transport 1.7 million tonnes of oil through the Baku-Novorossiisk pipeline, up from 1.02 million tonnes in 2014.

SOCAR had initially planned to halt oil exports via Russia in February 2014 due to differences over transportation tariffs and volumes of supply, opting instead to send the bulk of its crude through the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan pipeline and retaining some to cover rising domestic demand for oil products. The company reversed its plans later that month.

Oil exports via Russia for the whole of 2013 totalled 1.75 million tonnes, down from 2.06 million in 2012.

 

(Reuters)