Officials from OAO Gazprom made the offer in Baku, where they were visiting along with Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Fradkov just days after Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliev threatened to decrease or halt altogether oil shipments through a Russian-controlled pipeline.

Aliev on Friday said the threat was a response to Russian calls for decreasing the amount of Russian gas the former Soviet republic receives next year, and charging more than twice as much for it — at US$230 (?173) per 1,000 cubic meters next year.

Azerbaijani Prime Minister Artur Rasizade said Monday that the price and volume of Russian gas was still open to negotiation.

"We should understand the Russian position, but it's another thing whether one feels like (understanding)," he said.

Azerbaijan, which has its own substantial gas and oil reserves, imported about 4.5 billion cubic meters from Russia in 2006 to cover domestic consumption.

The country has requested 3 billion cubic meters from Russia in 2007, Gazprom Deputy Chairman Valery Golyubev said. Gazprom is planning, however, to offer just 1.5 billion cubic meters, he said, asserting that Azerbaijan has enough in its own reserves to cover domestic needs.

Fradkov said that doubling Azerbaijan's gas prices to US$230 (?173) would be in line with Russian efforts to raise its own domestic gas export prices.

Concerns are mounting in Europe that Russia is moving to use its vast energy resources as a political weapon. For several former Soviet republics whose policies have not always coincided with Moscow's, Russia has threatened to dramatically hike natural gas prices.

Further adding to Western concerns, Moscow controls the pipelines delivering gas — and most oil — not only from Russia but also from much of Central Asia.

With the opening this year of a pipeline from Baku through Tbilisi and on to the Turkish Mediterranean port of Ceyhan, Azerbaijan now has an alternative export route to Russian-controlled pipelines, such as the one running from Baku to the Russian Black Sea port of Novorossiisk.

Azerbaijan exports about 17.5 million barrels of crude oil through the Russian pipeline.

Meanwhile, a top official for Russia's state-controlled pipeline monopoly said Kazakh crude could make up the difference if Azerbaijan cut its shipments into the Baku-Novorossiisk pipeline.

"We have expected this for a long time, that with the launch of the Baku-Ceyhan pipeline Azerbaijan will not pump its oil through our territory. There is no tragedy here," OAO Trasneft Vice President Sergei Grigoriev was quoted by Interfax as saying. "Russia is not losing anything ... Azerbaijan has the right to decide where it sends its oil." The Associated Press

/The International Herald Tribune/