Dubai's Dragon Oil, a subsidiary of Emirates National Oil Company, has expanded its investment in Turkmenistan's oil and gas industry.
The preliminary agreement signed between Dragon Oil and state-owned Turkmenistan Oil includes increasing production with three new fields within Turkmenistan's Block 19 offshore area, Dragon Oil said on Saturday.
Dragon Oil did not disclose the value of the investment. The company, however, said it had conducted a seismic survey in the three fields at a cost of $35 million, the results of which were “promising”.
The fields are close to the Cheleken Contract Area, which is an oil-producing field in the Caspian Sea.
“Turkmenistan is a very important oil country and has large oil and gas capabilities,” Ali Al Jarwan, chief executive of Dragon Oil, said in the statement.
“We are seeking to strengthen our presence there through new investments that will reflect positively on both parties enhancing the state’s income from revenue and creating new jobs.”
Turkmenistan is one of the five Caspian Sea littoral countries, which is an area with large volumes of oil and natural gas reserves.
The country had more than 600 million barrels of proven oil reserves and 19.5 trillion cubic metres of proven natural gas reserves at the end of 2020, latest data from the BP Statistical Review of World Energy had shown.
Oil production in the country stood at 216,000 barrels a day in 2022, according to the US International Trade Administration.
Turkmenistan is also rich in hydrocarbon resources, having produced about 80 billion cubic metres of natural gas in 2022, with half going to export, mostly to China, ITA data showed.
The country consumes roughly 60 per cent of its oil production domestically and exports the remainder over the Caspian Sea, the ITA said.
Dragon Oil's new expansion plans in Turkmenistan extend partnerships between the two sides.
In 2022, Dragon Oil signed an agreement with state-owned Turkmen Oil to extend their partnership for another 10 years.
Under that $1 billion renewed partnership, which begins in May 2025, Dragon Oil will pay $500 million in cash, with the remaining half spread out over the next 13 years.
At the time, Dragon Oil has invested about $8.1 billion in well drilling and production infrastructure over its then 22 years in Turkmenistan, achieving a cumulative production of 437 million barrels of crude oil.
Dragon Oil has also continued to build up its international portfolio. This week, the state-owned company announced that it has started crude oil production from the Al Wasl field, its first oil discovery in Egypt.
The Al Wasl field, discovered in 2021, has an oil reserve of more than 95 million barrels and Dragon Oil started the project with plans for “early production” with a total investment of $200 million, it said.
The project includes establishing an offshore production platform and extending a production line and an electricity line to operate oil production pumps, Dragon Oil said.
Dragon Oil also plans to expand its presence in the Egyptian market this year by stepping up exploration and expansion efforts in various regions, enhancing field development initiatives, and undertaking well restoration to augment oil production in the Gulf of Suez fields.
Dragon Oil, an upstream oil and gas exploration, development and production company, also operates in Iraq.
KILLING OF QASSEM SULEIMANI
Uefa Nations League: How it works
The Uefa Nations League, introduced last year, has reached its final stage, to be played over five days in northern Portugal. The format of its closing tournament is compact, spread over two semi-finals, with the first, Portugal versus Switzerland in Porto on Wednesday evening, and the second, England against the Netherlands, in Guimaraes, on Thursday.
The winners of each semi will then meet at Porto’s Dragao stadium on Sunday, with the losing semi-finalists contesting a third-place play-off in Guimaraes earlier that day.
Qualifying for the final stage was via League A of the inaugural Nations League, in which the top 12 European countries according to Uefa's co-efficient seeding system were divided into four groups, the teams playing each other twice between September and November. Portugal, who finished above Italy and Poland, successfully bid to host the finals.
WOMAN AND CHILD
Director: Saeed Roustaee
Starring: Parinaz Izadyar, Payman Maadi
Rating: 4/5
APPLE IPAD MINI (A17 PRO)
Display: 21cm Liquid Retina Display, 2266 x 1488, 326ppi, 500 nits
Chip: Apple A17 Pro, 6-core CPU, 5-core GPU, 16-core Neural Engine
Storage: 128/256/512GB
Main camera: 12MP wide, f/1.8, digital zoom up to 5x, Smart HDR 4
Front camera: 12MP ultra-wide, f/2.4, Smart HDR 4, full-HD @ 25/30/60fps
Biometrics: Touch ID, Face ID
Colours: Blue, purple, space grey, starlight
In the box: iPad mini, USB-C cable, 20W USB-C power adapter
Price: From Dh2,099
The smuggler
Eldarir had arrived at JFK in January 2020 with three suitcases, containing goods he valued at $300, when he was directed to a search area.
Officers found 41 gold artefacts among the bags, including amulets from a funerary set which prepared the deceased for the afterlife.
Also found was a cartouche of a Ptolemaic king on a relief that was originally part of a royal building or temple.
The largest single group of items found in Eldarir’s cases were 400 shabtis, or figurines.
Khouli conviction
Khouli smuggled items into the US by making false declarations to customs about the country of origin and value of the items.
According to Immigration and Customs Enforcement, he provided “false provenances which stated that [two] Egyptian antiquities were part of a collection assembled by Khouli's father in Israel in the 1960s” when in fact “Khouli acquired the Egyptian antiquities from other dealers”.
He was sentenced to one year of probation, six months of home confinement and 200 hours of community service in 2012 after admitting buying and smuggling Egyptian antiquities, including coffins, funerary boats and limestone figures.
For sale
A number of other items said to come from the collection of Ezeldeen Taha Eldarir are currently or recently for sale.
Their provenance is described in near identical terms as the British Museum shabti: bought from Salahaddin Sirmali, "authenticated and appraised" by Hossen Rashed, then imported to the US in 1948.
- An Egyptian Mummy mask dating from 700BC-30BC, is on offer for £11,807 ($15,275) online by a seller in Mexico
- A coffin lid dating back to 664BC-332BC was offered for sale by a Colorado-based art dealer, with a starting price of $65,000
- A shabti that was on sale through a Chicago-based coin dealer, dating from 1567BC-1085BC, is up for $1,950
Best Academy: Ajax and Benfica
Best Agent: Jorge Mendes
Best Club : Liverpool
Best Coach: Jurgen Klopp (Liverpool)
Best Goalkeeper: Alisson Becker
Best Men’s Player: Cristiano Ronaldo
Best Partnership of the Year Award by SportBusiness: Manchester City and SAP
Best Referee: Stephanie Frappart
Best Revelation Player: Joao Felix (Atletico Madrid and Portugal)
Best Sporting Director: Andrea Berta (Atletico Madrid)
Best Women's Player: Lucy Bronze
Best Young Arab Player: Achraf Hakimi
Kooora – Best Arab Club: Al Hilal (Saudi Arabia)
Kooora – Best Arab Player: Abderrazak Hamdallah (Al-Nassr FC, Saudi Arabia)
Player Career Award: Miralem Pjanic and Ryan Giggs
How The Debt Panel's advice helped readers in 2019
December 11: 'My husband died, so what happens to the Dh240,000 he owes in the UAE?'
JL, a housewife from India, wrote to us about her husband, who died earlier this month. He left behind an outstanding loan of Dh240,000 and she was hoping to pay it off with an insurance policy he had taken out. She also wanted to recover some of her husband’s end-of-service liabilities to help support her and her son.
“I have no words to thank you for helping me out,” she wrote to The Debt Panel after receiving the panellists' comments. “The advice has given me an idea of the present status of the loan and how to take it up further. I will draft a letter and send it to the email ID on the bank’s website along with the death certificate. I hope and pray to find a way out of this.”
November 26: ‘I owe Dh100,000 because my employer has not paid me for a year’
SL, a financial services employee from India, left the UAE in June after quitting his job because his employer had not paid him since November 2018. He owes Dh103,800 on four debts and was told by the panellists he may be able to use the insolvency law to solve his issue.
SL thanked the panellists for their efforts. "Indeed, I have some clarity on the consequence of the case and the next steps to take regarding my situation," he says. "Hopefully, I will be able to provide a positive testimony soon."
October 15: 'I lost my job and left the UAE owing Dh71,000. Can I return?'
MS, an energy sector employee from South Africa, left the UAE in August after losing his Dh12,000 job. He was struggling to meet the repayments while securing a new position in the UAE and feared he would be detained if he returned. He has now secured a new job and will return to the Emirates this month.
“The insolvency law is indeed a relief to hear,” he says. "I will not apply for insolvency at this stage. I have been able to pay something towards my loan and credit card. As it stands, I only have a one-month deficit, which I will be able to recover by the end of December."
Six large-scale objects on show
- Concrete wall and windows from the now demolished Robin Hood Gardens housing estate in Poplar
- The 17th Century Agra Colonnade, from the bathhouse of the fort of Agra in India
- A stagecloth for The Ballet Russes that is 10m high – the largest Picasso in the world
- Frank Lloyd Wright’s 1930s Kaufmann Office
- A full-scale Frankfurt Kitchen designed by Margarete Schütte-Lihotzky, which transformed kitchen design in the 20th century
- Torrijos Palace dome
Benefits of first-time home buyers' scheme
- Priority access to new homes from participating developers
- Discounts on sales price of off-plan units
- Flexible payment plans from developers
- Mortgages with better interest rates, faster approval times and reduced fees
- DLD registration fee can be paid through banks or credit cards at zero interest rates
