A senior official with the Chinese Ministry of Commerce has said there are no grounds for saying China's crude oil imports push up the global oil price, reports Tuesday's Economic Daily.

The official said that in 2005, the average price of crude oil imported into China was 51.5 U.S. dollars per barrel, 2.8 dollars lower than the international benchmark.

The result proved that Chinese companies have found ways to negotiate a high oil-price period and protect their own interests, said the official.

Statistics with the ministry show that China imported 127 million crude oil in 2005, and exported 8.07 million tons.

The official said China slowed down the pace of its growing oil imports last year, with the import growth rate 31.5 percent lower than the previous year, although the total imports are up 3.3 percent.

According to the ministry, the share of China's oil imports growth in terms of the world's overall growth has dropped from 30 percent in 2004 to the current 10 percent, a consequence of increasing domestic oil output and reducing dependence on imported oil.

Source: Xinhua