India and Venezuela will strike a barter deal

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India’s government agreed to strike a barter deal with Venezuela in order to settle past dues of $530-$600 million payable for its oil equity, S&P Global Platts informed citing a senior official at Indian state-owned Oil and Natural Gas Corp.

India’s ONGC Videsh Limited, that is the overseas arm of upstream major ONGC, possesses a 40% stake in the San Cristobal oil field in Venezuela. The company’s accumulated share of oil sales was also included into the dues.

"They [Venezuela's PDVSA] would be giving us crude every month," ONGC chairman and managing director D K Sarraf, who is also chairman of OVL, said after releasing ONGC's results for the second fiscal quarter (July-September).

Indian oil minister Dharmendra Pradhan raised the issue of past dues of $530 million-$600 million during a meeting with visiting Venezuelan oil minister Eulogio del Pino in August. During the meeting the countries discussed a possibility to set the issue by means of a barter deal.

Eight years ago Indian OVL invested around $190 million in the project where Venezuelan PDVSA holds a 60% stake, сообщает http://azinnov.com.