Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez on Wednesday announced a US$16 billion deal with China to drill for oil in the resource-rich Orinoco basin.
“Yesterday [Tuesday], a deal was signed in Beijing for the Orinoco basin. It sets out a Chinese investment of US$16 billion over the next three years,” Chavez said at a public event.
He gave few details of the pact and did not name the Chinese companies involved, but said they would form a joint venture with state-owned Petroleos de Venezuela (PDVSA) to produce 450,000 barrels a day of extra heavy crude.
PHOTO: AFP
Venezuela, a founding member of the oil cartel OPEC and Latin America’s top oil exporter, announced on Saturday that it had signed a similar accord with a Russian consortium.
The deal will see the group of five Russian companies invest more than US$20 billion over three years, and gives them rights to drill for oil in the part of the Orinoco oil belt.
PDVSA said production with the Russian companies on the massive Junin 6 heavy crude block would begin by 2012. Junin 6 is estimated to hold 53 billion barrels of heavy crude, making it one of the world’s largest reserves.
That joint venture — with the Russian companies Rosneft, Lukoil, Gazprom, TNK-BP and Surgutneftegaz — is expected to produce 450,000 barrels a day by 2012, Chavez said.
Chavez on hailed the two deals saying the total would boost production by 900,000 barrels a day, which would be marketed along with Russian and Chinese companies.
“In addition, there will be a flood of technology into the country, with China going to build drilling platforms, oil rigs, railroads, houses,” Chavez said.
Chavez said that during his recent visit to Moscow he signed the venture that would give PDVSA a 60 percent stake in the firm, with 40 percent to the consortium.
A Chinese freighter that allegedly snapped an undersea cable linking Taiwan proper to Penghu County is suspected of being owned by a Chinese state-run company and had docked at the ports of Kaohsiung and Keelung for three months using different names. On Tuesday last week, the Togo-flagged freighter Hong Tai 58 (宏泰58號) and its Chinese crew were detained after the Taipei-Penghu No. 3 submarine cable was severed. When the Coast Guard Administration (CGA) first attempted to detain the ship on grounds of possible sabotage, its crew said the ship’s name was Hong Tai 168, although the Automatic Identification System (AIS)
An Akizuki-class destroyer last month made the first-ever solo transit of a Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force ship through the Taiwan Strait, Japanese government officials with knowledge of the matter said yesterday. The JS Akizuki carried out a north-to-south transit through the Taiwan Strait on Feb. 5 as it sailed to the South China Sea to participate in a joint exercise with US, Australian and Philippine forces that day. The Japanese destroyer JS Sazanami in September last year made the Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force’s first-ever transit through the Taiwan Strait, but it was joined by vessels from New Zealand and Australia,
CHANGE OF MIND: The Chinese crew at first showed a willingness to cooperate, but later regretted that when the ship arrived at the port and refused to enter Togolese Republic-registered Chinese freighter Hong Tai (宏泰號) and its crew have been detained on suspicion of deliberately damaging a submarine cable connecting Taiwan proper and Penghu County, the Coast Guard Administration said in a statement yesterday. The case would be subject to a “national security-level investigation” by the Tainan District Prosecutors’ Office, it added. The administration said that it had been monitoring the ship since 7:10pm on Saturday when it appeared to be loitering in waters about 6 nautical miles (11km) northwest of Tainan’s Chiang Chun Fishing Port, adding that the ship’s location was about 0.5 nautical miles north of the No.
SECURITY: The purpose for giving Hong Kong and Macau residents more lenient paths to permanent residency no longer applies due to China’s policies, a source said The government is considering removing an optional path to citizenship for residents from Hong Kong and Macau, and lengthening the terms for permanent residence eligibility, a source said yesterday. In a bid to prevent the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) from infiltrating Taiwan through immigration from Hong Kong and Macau, the government could amend immigration laws for residents of the territories who currently receive preferential treatment, an official familiar with the matter speaking on condition of anonymity said. The move was part of “national security-related legislative reform,” they added. Under the amendments, arrivals from the Chinese territories would have to reside in Taiwan for
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