KIEV, Sept. 13 - Ukraine has been scrambling to secure supplies of Caspian Sea crude via its oil pipelines to the European Union after Russia virtually suspended its shipments via these pipelines earlier this year.

Ukraine has already purchased a test-run shipment of crude from Azerbaijan and has been now holding talks with Polish, Slovakian, Czech and Belarussian oil shippers to make sure the test-run is smooth.

“We are currently in talks with Gomeltransneft [of Belarus] and Przyjazn [of Poland] to organize the oil supply route to Plock and if there is a need further to Gdansk,” Oleksandr Lazorko, the head of UkrTransNafta, the state-owned oil shipper, said at a press conference. “I believe this route can [materialize] even this year.”