Iran’s media say US energy corporations are trying to find ways to establish a foothold in the country’s oil projects through front companies.
The Persian-language newspaper Aftab-e Yazd says chances are high that US corporations – that are banned from investing in Iran due to a set of sanctions by the Congress as well as the administration - team up with Europeans that are already welcome in Iran’s oil sector.
“There exists the possibility that the oil companies that approach Iran are in fact front companies of other major corporations,” Aftab-e Yazd has quoted energy expert Hassan Moradi as saying.
“For example, it is possible that a European company would attempt to invest in Iran in partnership with a US energy corporation,” Moradi added.
Aftab-e Yazd report has further highlighted a growing discouragement of leading companies over their plans to invest in US petrochemical projects, stressing that Iran’s petrochemical sector is now seen as a more lucrative alternative.
It has cited plans by South Africa’s Sasol to delay some of its plans to invest in US petrochemical industry and return to Iran as the latest evidence of this.
Iran’s media quoted Abbas She’ri-Moqaddam, the managing director of the National Petrochemical Company of Iran (NPC), as saying on August 22 that Sasol – that has already developed a major petrochemical project in Iran – is on its way back to the country.
Iran’s Oil Minister Bijan Zangeneh said in June that the country welcomes the participation of US corporations in its oil projects.
“We welcome the presence of American oil companies in Iran,” Zangeneh said. “We will definitely prepare the grounds for the presence of American oil companies in Iran”.
Nevertheless, he emphasized, US businesses will still have to wait for the removal of sanctions approved by the Congress and the administration that prevent them from investing in Iran.