Russia's Gazprom Neft moves to yuan in fuelling planes in China

Gazprom Neft, the oil arm of Russian gas giant Gazprom , has started to move away from the US dollar to China's yuan in settlements for fuelling planes in China, Gazprom Neft's CEO Alexander Dyukov said on Friday. The deal has been reached with China's national jet fuel operator, he said. "We start from September and may switch to all the settlements on jet fuel to yuan," Dyukov said. He also said that Chinese airlines in Russian airports may soon make their payments for buying fuel in Russian roubles. Russia and China have long planned to increase settlements in their local currencies in mutual trade. Moscow has been pushing for a greater role of the rouble on the global financial market and, eventually, as some form of a reserve currency. Beijing is also seeking a greater international role for the still tightly-controlled yuan. Dyukov said the company and the Chinese operator plan to double total volumes of aircraft fuelling both in Russia and China to 250,000 tonnes by 2025.<br/>