Hanoi  - A broken hose caused a small oil spill during a test-run of Vietnam's first oil refinery, a senior company official confirmed Wednesday.

The spill occurred off of Vietnam's central coast on Monday night as workers were pumping oil from the Singaporean tanker Eagle Milwaukee to the refinery, the official told Deutsche Presse-Agentur dpa, on condition of anonymity.

"Strong waves broke a cargo hose, so oil was spilled into the sea," he added, "but relevant agencies have tried to limit the spill."

The official declined to say how much oil was leaked, but local environmental sources from Quang Ngai province say it was relatively small.

Tallinn  - The presidents of the three Baltic states of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania met near the Estonian capital, Tallinn, Tuesday to discuss relations with Russia among other topics.

In the picturesque, snowbound surroundings of Sausti Manor, President Valdis Zatlers of Latvia and Valdas Adamkus of Lithuania were hosted by their Estonian counterpart, Toomas Hendrik Ilves.

After the meeting the three presidents told journalists that their countries should pursue pragmatic relations with Russia via their memberships of the European Union and NATO.

Madrid - A planned deal for the Russian oil giant Lukoil to become the biggest shareholder of Spain's top oil company Repsol YPF could collapse over lack of financing and Spanish political opposition, media reported Tuesday.

Lukoil is interested in buying nearly 30 per cent of Repsol in a deal estimated at up to 9.8 billion euros (12.5 billion dollars).

The purchase would include a 20-per-cent stake now held by the debt-ridden construction company Sacyr Vallehermoso and part of a

Oslo - Citing the effects of the global financial turmoil, the fund that invests income from Norway's petroleum and gas riches for future pensions on Tuesday reported its lowest return to date.

The return on the fund during third-quarter 2008 fell 7.7 per cent measured in international currency, the central bank that manages the fund said.

The Norwegian Government Pension Fund - Global was worth 2.12 trillion kroner (299 billion dollars) at the end of the third quarter.

Maputo - A consortium of South African and Mozambican energy companies have discovered two significant natural gas deposits off the coast of central Mozambique's Inhambane province, a local newspaper reported this week.

Minister of Natural Resources Esperanca Bias was quoted by the daily Noticias newspaper on Monday as saying that the reservoirs were found at a depth of 1.3 kilometres. The layers found were between seven and 15 meters in thickness and are believed to contain a considerable amount of gas.

The Union Government is unlikely to reduce prices of petroleum products as of now despite huge fall in the prices of crude oil in the international market. Crude prices were $142.04 a barrel on July 3 while currently they are fluctuating in between $47 -$50 per barrel. The public sector oil marketing companies have requested government to hold prices so that they can cover their previous losses. The Indian crude oil basket has averaged $52.78 a barrel in November as compared to October's average of $69.12.