RusEnergy

22 January 2007 - Upstream onLine - Moscow wants Indian companies to invest in its Sakhalin 3 oil and gas deposit, Russian defence minister Sergei Ivanov said on a visit to India today. Moscow is "interested in the participation of Indian capital in the development of the Sakhalin 3 project," Russia's Itar-Tass news agency reported Ivanov, who is also a deputy prime minister, as saying. He also said Indian companies could invest in the Vankor field in Siberia, Reuters reported. US supermajors ExxonMobil and Chevron were part of a consortium which originally won a preliminary bid to develop the Sakhalin 3 field, off Russia's Pacific coast. But that consortium was dissolved and Russia is seeking to re-auction the deposit. Russia has awarded rights to develop smaller fields within the Sakhalin 3 deposit. A consortium of China's Sinopec and Russia's state-owned Rosneft has started exploratory drilling on one of those smaller fields. India's state-owned Oil and Natural Gas Corporation (ONGC) agreed several years ago to buy 20% of Sakhalin 1, a $17 billion oil and gas development led by ExxonMobil and involving Rosneft. Russian media have reported that the inclusion of ONGC in Sakhalin 1 was part of a broader agreement involving a multi-billion-dollar deal to supply Russian weapons to India, though this has never been confirmed. Vankor, in eastern Siberia, has estimated reserves of 2.5 billion barrels. It is operated by Rosneft.