Tehran, Iran, November 8
By Mehdi Sepahvand – Trend:
In recent weeks Russian companies have reached new agreements with Iranian counterparts in the energy sector. This fresh turn for Iran comes after European companies faced new challenges regarding doing business in the Islamic Republic.
Russian gas giant Gazprom signed an initial agreement with Iranian state-run investment fund IDRO to cooperate in unspecified oil, gas and energy projects this Sunday.
Also, Otabek Karimov, Russneft vice president in commerce and logistics, Andrey Laveez, the company's chief geologist, and Vlada Rusakova, the vice president in gas business also recently met with Iran’s Deputy Oil Minister Amirhossein Zamaninia, expressing eagerness to launch cooperation with Iran on swap of crude oil as well as on expansion of Iranian oilfields.
Russia has been an old ally of Iran in political issues regarding the Middle East. This has earned Moscow the chance to develop two new nuclear power plants, besides the first one which the country also completed for Iran.
The Islamic Republic once appeared passionately interested in collaboration with Western giants like Shell and Total under the presumably protective umbrella of its 2015 nuclear deal with world powers, which lifted economic sanctions. Iran was hoping that in cooperation with Western companies, it would develop its ageing upstream and downstream infrastructure.
At such time, however, and despite the fact that Iran had already signed billion-dollar deals with some of these European companies, US President Donald Trump triggered a new round of pressure on Iran, calling on America’s European allies to push for more sanctions on Iran for issues such as Tehran’s missile program and regional policy.
This has affected the prospects of prosperity in Iran for European companies. As a result, Russia which helped Iran to develop its nuclear facilities, now seems the fittest choice to develop its oil and gas sector as well.
However, there is concern that Russian companies might not be able to operate as European ones could have.
Abdolkarim Jamiri, former member of the Iranian Parliament’s Committee on Energy, told Trend that Russian companies’ records do not indicate any spectacular deeds in the field of energy.
"You cannot really say they have had great achievements," he said.
However, the former MP noted, that at present Russian companies seem to be the best choice for Iran, because since Iran and Russia share interests, cooperation in the field of energy can be beneficial to both.
In order to develop its oil and gas industry properly, Iran needs to lure about $200 billion in investment by 2021. The prospects of succeeding in doing so have already took a hard blow from Trump’s newly adopted Iran strategy, giving Russia a better chance to fill in the gap for Iran.