LSEG data showed that Turkey increased its imports of Russia’s Urals crude to 7,41 million barrels in October from 5,15 million barrels in September, due to a rise in demand and the completion of refinery maintenance.

After the STAR refinery, owned by Azerbaijani SOCAR, completed a month-long major maintenance on October 23, Turkey, one the largest Russian oil buyers, will purchase the highest volume of Urals since July.

Two traders who deal in Russian oil sales into Turkey confirmed that the STAR refinery had already begun purchasing Urals to be delivered by end-October.

The traders also said that the refineries of Turkish firm Tupras increased their purchases of Russian oil in this month, due to the lack of alternatives available on the Mediterranean.

According to LSEG, in September, Turkish refineries bought eight cargoes from Iraq of Basrah Crude, including the Light, Heavy, and Medium grades. The data show that in October, Turkey imported just four cargoes each of Basrah Heavy or Basrah Medium.

The traders say that the Turkish interest in Urals is due to a reduction in Russian oil exports in November which may support prices.

The oil exports of Russia from its western ports, Primorsk Ust-Luga Novorossiisk will fall to 1,95 million barrels a day (about 8 millions tons) in November compared to 2,25 million barrels a day in October due the completion of planned refinery maintenance.

Traders said that India will also increase its demand for Russian oil, with deliveries in November and December. Last week, BPCL - a major buyer of Russian crude oil - announced that it had completed maintenance on its Kochi refining plant with a 6 million ton capacity. (Reporting and Editing by David Holmes).

(source: Reuters)