Baku, Azerbaijan, June 6
By Fatih Karimov - Trend:
Iran has called on the Japanese company Mitsui to resume its activities in the Iranian petrochemical sector.
Iran's Deputy Oil Minister Amir Hossein Zamaninia, in a meeting with Atsushi Kume, the Mitsui chief operating officer for Europe, the Middle East and Africa, called for cooperation in Iranian upstream and downstream oil and gas projects, as well as petrochemical sector, SHANA news agency reported June 6.
"Giving the Mitsui's brilliant experience in petrochemical industry, the company can take part actively in Iran's petrochemical projects," Zamaninia said.
He added that Iran plans to attract some $80 billion of investment in its petrochemical industry within the next 10 years, expressing hope for return of the Japanese company to Iran's petrochemical industry.
Kume for his part lauded the key role of Iran in the region, noting that cooperation with the Islamic Republic is important for Mitsui.
Mitsui's office in Tehran rejected to provide further details regarding the talks and the company's future plans for cooperation with the Islamic Republic.
Iran's petrochemical output capacity currently stands at 61 million tons. The Islamic Republic hopes to bring this capacity to 120 million tons by 2020 and 180 million tons by 2025.
Petrochemical plants in Iran had to work below the actual production capacity due to the shortage of natural gas as feedstock, old production units, and the sanctions, which caused a decline in exports.