OREANDA-NEWS. June 22, 2011. China's commercial crude oil stocks fell 3.5 percent at the end of May from the previous month, data from a newsletter published by the official Xinhua News Agency showed on Tuesday.

 Inventories of refined oil products at the end of last month rose 2.6 percent from a month earlier, the Xinhua Oil, Gas and Petrochemicals (OGP) reported.

 Among the fuels, kerosene inventories rose the sharpest, up 8 percent month on month, diesel stocks were up 3 percent, and gasoline stocks up 1 percent, it said.

 The Chinese government has asked its two oil majors, CNPC and Sinopec Group, to accelerate expansion of commercial oil storage facilities to secure domestic supply amid fluctuation of international oil prices, local media has reported.

 CNPC, parent of Asia's largest oil and gas producer PetroChina and Sinopec Group, parent of top Asian refiner Sinopec Corp will build some 3 million tonnes of new oil storage facilities in coastal areas.

 The new storage, mainly to store crude oil, will be built near existing commercial crude storage facilities in the major cities of Shanghai and Tianjin and coastal provinces of Zhejiang, Fujian and Hebei.