Belneftekhim called the decision of the management of Uralkali to stop exporting products through the Belarusian Potash Company (BPC) a “provocation” that brought down the world potash fertilizer market, RIA Novosti reports, citing a source in the concern.

“We believe that the decision of Uralkali also publicly revealed the negative attitude of this company towards partnerships with the Belarusian side within the framework of the BPC, which could be traced in the conduct of business by the Russian side over the past years,” said a representative of Belneftekhim.

According to him, the concern assesses the decision of Uralkali management as extremely unprofessional and pursuing, first of all, the personal interests of the owners of the Russian company. He noted that previously there had been untimely return of money from Russian partners to Belaruskali for supplied fertilizers, demands to reimburse part of Uralkali’s transportation costs, etc. “The recent attempts by Uralkali OJSC to block the work of BPC regional offices and paralyze the company’s activities as a whole leave a particularly negative impression,” he said.

The agency's interlocutor noted that Belaruskali supplied 1.7% of its products outside the BPC (45,000 tons of potash fertilizers for five months of 2013), while Uralkali exported 69% of potassium through its trader (Uralkali-Trading) in parallel with BKK.

Officially, the press service of Belneftekhim reported that they would soon make a statement regarding the conflict with Uralkali. RIA Novosti was unable to get a comment from Uralkali.

Earlier, Uralkali CEO Vladislav Baumgertner, in an interview with the Vedomosti newspaper, said that the conflict with Belarusian partners was related to the December decree of Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko, within the framework of which Belaruskali was given the opportunity to sell products not only through BPC, but also through independent traders.

“All this time we asked the other side to cancel this decree in order to give a clear signal to the market that we are still together and present a united front. Unfortunately, this did not happen <...> After that, we saw that the market written proposals appear from various traders who offer goods on behalf of Belaruskali, and then we were faced with a choice: either watch and observe how BPC is falling apart, or start being proactive,” Baumgertner explained.

The Belarusian side accused the management of Uralkali of provocation