RUSSIA and Libya signed a deal on Tuesday for the construction of a branch of a major gas pipeline in the North African state. Under the $182-million contract between Russian firm Zarubezhneftegazstroi and Libya’s National Oil Corporation, the 117-kilometre section of the Khums-Tripoli pipeline will be completed in January 2001. It will be part of a gas network which will eventually cover virtually all of Libya, from “Tunisia to Egypt,” Ahmed al-Hadi Aun, an official from the Libyan energy committee said. The agreement was signed during a meeting of the Russian-Libyan inter-governmental commission on trade and economic cooperation.