Montenegro oil agreement to be revised
PODGORICA (Reuters) – The Montenegrin government said yesterday it was negotiating a revision of an Adriatic offshore oil and gas concession with British company Ramco Energy Plc. «The government has restarted talks on revising the agreement with which we would like to better define joint relations,» Montenegrin Deputy Prime Minister Miroslav Ivanisevic told reporters. In 1998 Ramco subsidiary Medusa Oil and Gas and Montenegrin national oil company Jugopetrol Kotor clinched a 25-year deal on exploration and exploitation of crude oil in the southern sector of the republic. The agreement covers an area of almost 4,000 square kilometers from Buljarice to the river of Bojana at the Albanian border, 90 percent of which is offshore. Ramco originally had a 51 percent stake in a Kotor-based joint venture company, Product Oil, that would carry out exploration, development and production, plus the marketing and sale of any gas or oil produced. When Greece’s Hellenic Petroleum bought a majority stake in Jugopetrol Kotor in October 2002 the participation in the joint venture changed so that Jugopetrol now has 60 percent and Ramco 40 percent.
