Qatar's Minister of State for Energy Affairs and President and CEO of QatarEnergy Saad Sherida al-Kaabi speaks at a press conference after signing an agreement with the CEO of American multinational corporation ConocoPhillips, at the QatarEnergy headquarters in Doha on Oct. 30, 2022. (Credit: Karim Jaafar/AFP)
DOHA — State-owned QatarEnergy is in talks with the Lebanese government to take a 30 percent stake in an offshore exploration block and is also negotiating with TotalEnergies and ENI on this matter, CEO Saad al-Kaabi confirmed on Sunday.
Two sources told Reuters last week that TotalEnergies and the Lebanese government have reached a deal handing the French oil major temporary majority control of the block and paving the way for negotiations with Qatar over a stake in the gas project.
"We are in the process of discussing that with the government of Lebanon and the partners, Total and ENI, for a participation of around 30 percent ownership of that exploration block," Kaabi said.
"In due course when we get that basically finalized as an agreement, and we sign that agreement, we will announce it."
The initial exploration license was held by a three-part consortium of TotalEnergies, Italy's Eni and Novatek. Beirut announced in September that Novatek, which held a 20 percent stake, would exit.
Lebanon's cabinet issued an unpublished decision on Oct. 21, a copy of which was seen by Reuters, assigning Novatek's stake to a firm called Daja 216 and transferring TotalEnergies's 40 percent stake to another company, Daja 215. The two sources had told Reuters that Daja 215 and Daja 216 were TotalEnergies vehicles, which L'Orient-Le Jour had already confirmed for Daja 215, a company registered in Courbevoie, France, headed by Dimitri Lobadowski, a director of Total in Russia.
The sources had said that the understanding between TotalEnergies and Lebanon was that the French group would enter negotiations with QatarEnergy over the former Novatek stake, and that Qatar was seeking a 30 percent stake, comprised of Novatek's former stake and a 5 percent stake from each of TotalEnergies and Eni.
Offshore areas in the eastern Mediterranean and Levant have yielded major gas discoveries in the past decade. Interest in them has grown since Russia's invasion of Ukraine disrupted gas supplies.