Thaindian News

Tehran, Dec 26 (IANS) A Ukrainian company will invest $1 billion to develop three Iranian oilfields, a media report said.

Iran’s Petroleum Engineering and Development Company (PEDC) and Ukraine’s Inter Naft Gas Prom Pars will sign the contract by the end of the current Iranian year (March 20), said Press TV.

Under the comprehensive development plan of the three oil fields Koohmond, Boushkan and Kouhkali, 10,000 to 12,000 barrels of oil are expected to be produced per day in the first phase, and about 25,000 barrels per day in the second phase. A barrel equals 159 litres.

On Dec 18, Iranian media reported that it signed an oil contract worth $1 billion with the Russian Tatarstan republic’s Tatneft Oil Company on development of Zagheh oil field in southern Iran. But Tatneft Oil Company denied such reports two days later, reported Xinhua.

Iran is under Western sanctions that affect the international investments in its oil and gas projects over its controversial nuclear programme which the West claims to aim at military purposes. But the Iranian government rejects such allegations.

Several Western energy investors, including Total and Shell, have already withdrawn from the country’s energy sector.

In October, Iran said it had replaced Russia’s Gazprom by some Iranian companies in the on-shore oil field of Azar after the Russian company failed to fulfill its obligations to finalise the project.