MOSCOW, 14 October 2004 — President Vladimir Putin headed to Beijing yesterday saying firmly that Russia would be driven only by its own interests in deciding to feed rivals China or Japan through a future Far Eastern oil pipeline.

Putin told Chinese reporters in an interview whose transcript was released by the Kremlin that the charged geopolitical debate over access to Russia’s Siberian oil riches had not been settled yet.

Both China and Japan — concerned about energy supplies in a tight market and eagerly eyeing reserves hidden in Russia’s frozen fields — have dangled billions of dollars in investments before the Kremlin if their preferred pipeline route is picked.

Chinese Prime Minister Wen Jiabao promised to invest about $12 billion in the Russian energy sector during a visit to Moscow last month.

But Putin pointedly said in the interview that he would rather see China put its money into sectors other than energy.

“We welcome China’s plans to invest in the Russian economy,” he said. “But I repeat, we would like these investments to be fairly balanced ... and they must first of all be focused on high-end technologies,” the Russian president said.

The Japanese government has also vowed to invest at least $5 billion in Russia’s underdeveloped Far Eastern regions should Moscow decide to build the longer pipeline to the Sea of Japan port town of Nakhodka.

That more expensive option would have the added benefit of not only serving the burgeoning Japanese market but also potentially reaching US west coast shores by sea.

Meanwhile, the planned auction of oil giant Yukos’ core production unit is an “absurd” scheme that will only dent Russian oil export capacity, a top Yukos manager said in an interview with AFP.

“The sale of Yugansneftegaz, whose main activity is production, is absurd,” Sergei Kudryashov, executive director of the key Yukos subsidiary, said at the company’s headquarters in this Siberian city.

Kudryashov also slammed the $10.4 billion price tag that the Russian government put on Yugansneftegaz in announcing Tuesday their intention to auction the company, saying its real value was closer to $30 billion.