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Private companies can claim for Russian shelf sectors, from which state-run companies refused

Meanwhile, the Ministry of Natural Resources offers to toughen the taxation regime for private oil companies

NOVY URENGOY, January 15 (Itar-Tass) — The private companies can claim for several sectors of the Russian continental shelf, from which the state-run companies refused, Russian Minister of Natural Resources and Ecology Sergei Donskoy said at a meeting devoted to the prospects of the resources of the Russian continental shelf here on Tuesday.

Meanwhile, the Ministry of Natural Resources offers to toughen the taxation regime for private oil companies in case of their permission to develop the continental shelf.

“It is expedient for such shelf sectors to envisage an opportunity to permit to develop them by the companies, which are in private property and have the necessary experience for the appropriate works on the continental shelf in order to explore and produce the natural resources,” he said.

The Ministry of Natural Resources and the Ministry of Economic Development have drafted the corresponding mechanism, Donskoy said. “For the sectors of the continental shelf, in which regional exploration was completed and from which the state-run companies refused, it is expedient to establish the procedure to grant for operation similar sectors of the natural resources on the land,” Donskoy explained. He noted that the sectors of the continental shelf can be allocated on the basis of the bids from the companies and on the results of the auctions in case of several companies concerned. “In case of discovery of a deposit on the results of the geological prospecting the right of operation for the exploration and production in the discovered deposit should be granted to an entity, which has done the discovery,” Donskoy added. “Meanwhile, the mechanism of option can be developed that grants to the state-run company the right to incorporate in the project as a partner,” the minister underlined.