Middle East

Kurdish government ‘happy’ about expanding energy partnership with Russia

17/08/2017

The Kurdistan Regional Government has signed deals with several Russian oil and gas factories and is glad about the development of partnership with Russia, the government spokesman told Sputnik.

ERBIL (Sputnik) – “In more recent months the KRG signed contracts with several oil and energy companies in Russia and this is developing into a much more solid relationship with Russia and we are quite happy with this,” Safeen Dizayee said.

Dizayee said he was referring, in particular, to the contracts with Russia’s Gazprom and Rosneft energy companies.

Russia’s Gazprom Neft company, a Gazprom oil subsidiary, is working on three oil projects in Iraqi Kurdistan, in two of which, namely Shakal and Halabja, the company owns a majority stake.

In June, Rosneft and Iraqi Kurdistan signed a series of agreements with a 20-year timeframe on the cooperation on exploration and production of hydrocarbons.

Dizayee also said that Russian President Vladimir Putin and Prime Minister of the Regional Government of Iraqi Kurdistan Nechirvan Barzani had a fruitful meeting on the sidelines of the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum (SPIEF) in June.

Iraqi Kurdistan is an autonomous region within Iraq, which is currently preparing to hold an independence referendum in September.