RUSSIA - Companies' External Investments - TatNeft.

The NOC of Tatarstan, TatNeft in 2001 received provisional approval to develop the Paydar and Paydar West oilfields in central Iran under a buyback contract. Three wells at the fields had been drilled earlier but there require rehabilitation.

TatNeft in 2001 got UN approval to drill 45 wells at Iraq's Saddam and Bai Hassan oilfields for the state-owned foreign trade firm ZarubezhNeft, and to drill 33 wells for Iraq's state-owned Northern Oil. It is hoping to win blocks and field rehabilitation project in Iraq after the current Baghdad-US confrontation. TatNeft is also interested in Sudan's E&P prospects.

SlavNeft: Owned by Russian and Belarusian interests, SlavNeft in early 2002 signed a contract to develop the Luhais oilfield in southern Iraq where it is to drill 25 wells, and to drill wells at the giant Nahr Umr and Zubair oilfields at the depth of 3,000 metres.

In 2001 SlavNeft was one of the bidders to buy the 33,000 b/d oil produc-ing JV in Russia's Khanty-Mansiysk region, White Nights (WN). But INA of Croatia in 2002 sold WN to RosNefteGaz for $74m, reportedly more than double the asking price.

When the company was under Mikhail Gutseriyev, in early 2002 SlavNeft got a PSA in Sudan from state-owned Sudapet to develop Block 9 in the centre of that country and invest up to $200m. But in May he was replaced by Yuri Sukhanov as company president and CEO who in Aug. decided to pull out of Sudan, which he regarded as a high-risk country because of a war with rebels in the south.