Russia/Venezuela

Russia and Venezuela to coordinate energy policies

Article published on the 2008-07-23 Latest update 2008-07-23 15:07 TU

Medvedev (l) and Chavez
(Photo: Reuters)

Russian President Dmitry Medvedev announced that Moscow will co-ordinate energy policies with Venezuela, after hosting lucrative talks with President Hugo Chavez. Both countries are leading oil and gas producers. The talks, held at Medvedev's home outside Moscow, resulted in an agreement for Russian companies Gazprom, Lukoil and TKK-BP to work in oil-rich Venezuela.

Medvedev is a former chairman of Gazprom.

"Russia and Venezuela are oil and gas powers and energy security depends on our combined actions. We will work on co-ordination but our co-operation is not aimed against third countries," Medvedev said after the meeting.

Chavez, who arrived in Moscow on Tuesday for the two-day meeting, had another take on the bilateral meeting. "This will guarantee the sovereignty of Venezuela because we are now threatened by the United States," he said.

"Chavez is quite keen probably to get some help since he's thrown out some of the [oil company] majors and sharply constrained the activities in Venezuela," Rose Gottemoeller, of the Carnegie Centre in Moscow, told RFI. "So he's probably eager to get some help in producing oil in his own country."

The two leaders also discussed creating a possible leading gas producers' group that mirrors the oil producers cartel Opec. Russia is the world's largest gas producer.

Chavez is due to sign a 1.3 billion euro arms deal with Russia for new missile defence systems and diesel-powered submarines.

The Venezuelan president has gone onto Minsk to discuss ongoing energy and military co-operation with President Alexander Lukashenko. Belarus has already worked on developing Venezuelan oil fields in exhange for Soviet-era military know-how.