RUSSIA - Feb. 5 - Oman Agrees To Take In Tanker.

US State Department spokesman James Foley says the GCC state of Oman has agreed to take in the Russian tanker seized by the US Navy in the Gulf on suspicion of smuggling Iraqi oil in defiance of UN sanctions. Foley says the US-led multinational interception force (MIF) has already taken a sample of the fuel oil from the tanker for analysis of its origin. (US Navy personnel, enforcing the ban on unauthorised oil exports by Iraq, boarded the Russian tanker Volgoneft-147 on Feb. 2 and decided to divert it to a nearby port.) Foley says: "Oman has accepted to receive it for UN sanctions enforcement action...It could go into Omani waters and dock at an Omani port over the next day or so". He says: "A sample of the oil from the ship is currently being analysed to determine its origin... We don't yet have a final determination and we would hope to have the results of the analysis by early next week". On Feb. 4, US Secretary of State Albright spoke about the tanker with Russian FM IIvanov, who said in public earlier that Russia had sent a formal demand that the US release the vessel. Foley says: "She stressed that this is not a bilateral issue but a multilateral enforcement of international law". A US official confirms that the Russians were demanding the release of the tanker but did not challenge the legitimacy of the blockade which the US Navy is enforcing. Foley says Russian consular officers spent most of Feb. 4 aboard the vessel and were satisfied that the US Navy had treated the Russian crews correctly. Vladimir Likuchev, an official at ship-owner Transpetro-Volga, says: "We had a brief talk on the phone with the captain of the ship and he said their supplies are coming to an end". But a US official says: "The Russians have acknowledged to us that the diversion has proceeded smoothly".