Russia to press ahead with Crimea power plants despite Siemens row - RIA

Russia will press ahead with plans to build two new power stations in Crimea despite a dispute with German industrial group Siemens, Andrei Cherezov, a Russian deputy energy ministry, said on Friday, the RIA news agency reported.

Siemens said earlier on Friday it was halting deliveries of power equipment to Russian state-controlled customers after it said it had credible evidence that four gas turbines it had delivered to Russia had been illegally moved to annexed Crimea.

"The schedule has beet set and is for the first quarter of 2018," RIA cited Cherezov as saying about the two power plants which require turbines to become operational. "Nothing has been changed. Our main task is that the stations will start generating power in the first quarter of 2018."

(This article has not been edited by DNA's editorial team and is auto-generated from an agency feed.)