DW-World.de
Deutsche Welle

Five former communist-bloc countries have signed a deal to extend an oil pipeline to bypass Russia, in order to diversify supplies and cut their reliance on Moscow. Azerbaijan, Georgia, Lithuania, Poland and Ukraine signed the deal to establish the Sarmatia consortium in the Lithuanian capital Vilnius late on Wednesday. The consortium is to assess a number of options, including building a network that delivers oil from Azerbaijan through Poland, on to Western European markets. The five nations fear that Russia is increasingly exploiting its oil and gas market dominance in order to force smaller countries to toe Moscow’s line. All five countries were once under Soviet control.