South Korea looking for energy from Azerbaijan

(By Razib Ahmed)
These days, we often see media reports that become of having continuous high economic growth; India and China are aggressively pursuing energy sources in various parts of the world. China is even pursuing oil fields in Africa. One place is very attractive to both China and India- Central Asia. It seems that now Korea has joined the game. Korean president, Roh Moo-hyun and Azeri President Ilham Heydar Aliyev have signed a number of deals and the most important of them all is that Korea National Oil Corp. will jointly develop oil fields in Azerbaijan with Azerbaijan’s state oil company SOCAR.

This is a significant deal between the two countries. Korea imports 100% of its crude oil and 98% of gas from aboard. Korea is trying to find new sources of energy from which it can import. Azerbaijan will be a good destination in this regard. On the other hand, Azerbaijan has been actively seeking foreign investment in its energy sector for the last few years. Korea is a rich country with state of the art technology and thus Azerbaijan will be hopeful to get a good price for its oil. Thus it is a win-win situation for both the countries.

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