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Gulf Petrochem Group has moved to strengthen its European bunkering division by establishing a Russia and Baltic trading desk at its office in Dordrecht, near Rotterdam.

Boris Kuftyrev, who previously held the position of head of sales at Gazpromneft Marine Bunker, has been appointed to manage the new desk and tasked with developing the group's presence in Russia and the Baltic region. The desk will be overseen by Chris Todd, Head of Bunkers (West of Suez).

The appointment of Kuftyrev follows the recent addition of Maxime Cramer - who previously held trading positions with OW Bunker and Minerva Bunkers - to Gulf Petrochem's Netherlands-based trading team earlier this year.

The Netherlands office currently caters to the group's global customers and has been providing them with the supply of marine fuel products in the Amsterdam-Rotterdam-Antwerp (ARA) region since the launch of the company's physical supply operations in Rotterdam and Antwerp in July and October, respectively. Deliveries in the ARA region are performed using the exclusively time-chartered barges Valsinni, Virage, Vantage and Chardonnay.

The Dordrecht office also carries out worldwide cargo and bunker trading and the company reconfirmed on Thursday that it is looking to expand its barge fleet in Europe, add a new physical area and another trading office in Europe during the course of this year. Gulf Petrochem's European expansion plan for 2017 was previously announced in February.

Commenting on the company's recent appointments, Todd said: "Since the turn of the year, our team has been growing steadily and the recent appointment to our European division is reflective of the group's performance in Europe. We are sure, establishing further supply coverage in Russia and the Baltics by way of hiring someone with Boris' experience will only add to our strong customer offering."

Prerit Goel, Gulf Petrochem Group Director, remarked: "Our European division has performed extremely well so far in 2017 and this expansion and appointment is reflective of that. Our customer base is expanding which fits perfectly with our long-term strategic objective for the group's bunkering division."