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Russia's agencies will study Iran's plans to create a natural gas hub on the Persian Gulf in cooperation with Russia, Qatar, and Turkmenistan, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergey Ryabkov said on Thursday.
On Wednesday, Iranian Oil Minister Javad Owji said that Iran is looking to set up a natural gas hub in the Persian Gulf and is cooperating with Russia, Qatar, and Turkmenistan to that end.
"With the cooperation of Russia, Turkmenistan, and Qatar, we are trying to have a gas hub in the Asaluyeh region, and its preparations are being planned," Iranian media quoted Owji as saying.
Asaluyeh is a port and energy hub in the southern Bushehr province in the Gulf.
Russia welcomes initiatives aimed at addressing energy security, Ryabkov said on Thursday, as quoted by Russian news agency Interfax.
"We welcome initiatives that help deal with the energy security problem in a broad sense and contribute to continued development of Russian-Iranian relations, and in general, we are open to constructive ideas," Ryabkov was quoted as saying.
"Definitely, economic operators and the relevant executive federal agencies will thoroughly study this idea. We have close contacts with all the above-mentioned actors in this context," Ryabkov added.
Iran is estimated to hold the world's second-largest natural gas reserves, second only to Russia, and ahead of Qatar, Turkmenistan, and the United States. With 32 trillion cubic meters, Iran is home to 16% of global natural gas reserves.
A lot of Iran's gas reserves are concentrated in the South Pars offshore field in the Persian Gulf, which it shares with Qatar.
Development of Iran's massive gas reserves has been challenging because of the pullout of Western supermajors such as TotalEnergies in the wake of the reinstated U.S. sanctions against Tehran by former President Donald Trump.
In recent years, Iran has forged closer ties with Russia and Venezuela, which are also under sanctions by the U.S. and the West.
By Tsvetana Paraskova for Oilprice.com
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Tsvetana is a writer for Oilprice.com with over a decade of experience writing for news outlets such as iNVEZZ and SeeNews. More