Business
Sonangol of Angola withdraws from Iran gas project
(Reuters) – Angolan state oil company Sonangol has pulled out of a US$7.5 billion natural gas project in Iran and informed the Iranian government it can no longer operate there because of sanctions, a senior company official said on Friday.
“We are out of Iran,” Mateus Morais de Brito, a member of the company’s executive board, said at a news conference in Luanda.
“Nowadays it has become unsustainable for us to develop technical and operational activities in Iran due to this matter of the sanctions,” Mateus Morais de Brito, a member of the company’s executive board, said at a news conference in Luanda.
A recording of the briefing was obtained by Reuters.
U.S. and European diplomatic efforts have included a push to get African countries to cut economic ties with Iran over its nuclear programme.
Angola’s departure is significant as it is a major energy player in its own right and Africa’s second-biggest oil producer after Nigeria. The country is also the second-largest crude supplier to China after Saudi Arabia.
Sonangol took a 20 percent stake in Iran’s South Pars-12 natural gas project in December 2009, replacing Austria’s OMV in the venture. At the time the project was expected to be developed at a cost of US$7.5 billion.
