China has always been the bigger presence of the two in West Karoun, particularly after it signed the landmark all-encompassing ‘Iran-China 25-Year Comprehensive Cooperation Agreement’ with Iran, as first revealed anywhere in the world in my 3 September 2019 article on the subject and also detailed in my latest book. Gazprom further pledged assistance in the completion of various LNG projects and the construction of gas export pipelines, and crucially, to provide the technology and equipment to increase output from its holdings in the West Karoun oil fields cluster. It is worth noting here that although the current rate of recovery across the site ranges from just 3.5% to 4.5%, before the U.S. withdrawal from the JCPOA in 2018 and the subsequent reimposition of sanctions against Iran, several international oil companies presented realistic plans to Iran’s Petroleum Ministry detailing how they would dramatically increase the average rate of recovery in very quick time, as examined in full in my latest book on the new global oil market order.
Author: Simon Watkins
Published at: 2025-09-09 23:00:00
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