Gazprom CEO Alexei Miller visited the Kremlin for talks with President Vladimir Putin just days after returning from high-level meetings in Beijing.

Natural gas export was on the president's agenda, including the building of infrastructure for deliveries to China.

Putin told Miller that he wanted to see deliveries of natural gas from the Yamal Peninsula to the Asian country. A new delivery route can be developed through Mongolia, the president said.

"Please have a look at the resources in Yamal so the necessary volumes can be delivered on a western route to China via Mongolia," Putin requested.

"I know that the route is difficult, but preliminary assessments of the issue have shown that it is fully realistic, and our Chinese partners also tend to think so," he added.

Until recently, the so-called western pipeline route between Russia and China was projected to run through Russia's republic of Altai and into China’s Xinjiang province. Now, Mongolia has become part of the picture.