MEOG: Focus on Kuwait-Iran border talks

Kuwait has called on Iran to come to the table and negotiate on the demarcation of their shared maritime border as the Arab state looks to begin drilling a contested gas field.

Kuwait News Agency (KUNA) quoted a source from the country’s Foreign Ministry as saying that the resources of the Dorra gas field are “shared between Kuwait and Saudi Arabia,” noting that the countries have “exclusive rights”, though Iran contests the share of the reservoir which it calls Arash.

Meanwhile, managing director of the National Iranian Oil Co. (NIOC), Mohsen Khojstehmehr, said last week that Iran was “fully prepared to start drilling in the joint Arash oilfield,” adding that “considerable resources have been allocated” to the project.

In December, subsidiaries of Saudi Aramco and Kuwait Petroleum Corp. (KPC) signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) on the development of the field. Kuwait Gulf Oil Co. (KGOC) and Aramco Gulf Oil Co. (AGOC) agreed to jointly develop the field in the Partitioned Neutral Zone (PNZ). Earlier in the year the parties agreed to “leverage modern technologies” to increase gas production from the asset to 1bn cubic feet (28mn cubic metres) per day alongside 84,000 barrels per day (bpd) of condensate.