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Iran rejects India’s bid to develop Farzad-B gas field

Business Materials 2 May 2015 15:14 (UTC +04:00)
Iran has rejected India’s bid to develop the Farzad-B gas field in its Farsi exploration block in the Gulf, Fars news agency reported May 2, quoting Iranian Oil Ministry sources.

Baku, Azerbaijan, May 2

By Fatih Karimov - Trend:

Iran has rejected India's bid to develop the Farzad-B gas field in its Farsi exploration block in the Gulf, Fars news agency reported May 2, quoting Iranian Oil Ministry sources.

A team led by India's joint secretary in petroleum ministry Ashutosh Jindal visited Tehran recently to persuade the country to give Indian state-run ONGC Videsh the contract for developing the gas field, discovered by the Indian firm in late 2012.

However, Iran did not accept India's package of proposals, citing a 14-year delay and bad performance in their obligations.

In a bid to pressure India, Iran put the Farzad-B gas field on a list of fields it plans to auction citing delays by the Indian companies in its development.

"We have started negotiations (with Iran) since OVL discovered the gas field. However, Iran has decided to auction the asset as, according to them, India did not make any efforts in the past three years to sign the contract," an Indian official who visited Tehran said.

ONGC Videsh Ltd, the overseas arm of state-owned ONGC, had in 2008 discovered the Farzad-B gas field.

However, ONGC Videsh had not signed the contract because of a threat of being sanctioned by the US, which is against any company investing more than $20 million in Iran's energy sector in any 12-month period.

Iran, in February 2012, issued a one-month ultimatum to the OVL-led consortium over the development of a gas field. For more than two years, it did not carry out the threat of cancelling allocation of the Farsi block to OVL.

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