Azerbaijan, Baku, Dec. 26 / Trend E. Kosolapova/
Kazakh National Oil and Gas Company KazMunaiGas is going to buy 50 percent stake in Russian oil company Centralnaya, a source in Russian government told Izvestia.
According to the source, KazMunaiGas has already applied to Russian Federal Antimonopoly Service for the deal approval.
"It is difficult to define the formation stage of the joint venture. This year our president expressed hope that it will be registered by the end of the year, but I think we cannot meet this deadline", a source in Lukoil said.
According to Lukoil representative, currently the government is working on the issue.
According Gazprom's information department, the parties agreed on Kazakhstan's participation in the project at the meeting in October 2012.
"The companies agreed on the constituent documents of the joint venture, its creation is scheduled for the near future," Gazprom said.
According to KazMunaiGas, total recoverable oil and gas reserves of Centralnoye field hit 101.4 million tons of oil, 7.5 million tons of gas condensate and 162.1 billion cubic meters of gas.
According to the Russian-Kazakh agreement from 2002, Centralnoye field is under Russian jurisdiction, meanwhile Kurmangazy and Khvalynskoye fields are under Kazakhstan's jurisdiction. The parties also agreed that the field will be developed by CentrKaspneftegas under a production sharing agreement.
In February 2012 the parties decided not to work in the field under production sharing agreement but create a join venture for its development.