MILAN: A Kazakhstan oil and gas company will buy a 10-percent stake in the giant Kazakh gas field owned by a global consortium that includes Chevron and ENI, the latter said on Wednesday.
The consortium will sell a 10-percent stake in the Karatchaganak field to KazMunaiGaz for one $1.0 billion (763 million euros), it said in a statement.
The deal, which was signed in the Kazakh capital Astana and which will take effect on June 30, 2012, "represents an important step forward in reinforcing cooperation" between the Kazakh state and the consortium, it said.
In October Kazakh press reports said that Timur Kulibayev, head of the giant state holding company Samruk-Kazyna and son-in-law of veteran President Nursultan Nazarbayev, mentioned on the sidelines of an energy forum that the state was ready to pay about one billion dollars for a 10 percent stake in the gas field.
KazMunaiGaz is a subsidiary of Samruk-Kazyna.
The massive Karachaganak field -- the BG Group estimates its gas reserves at 48 trillion cubic feet (1.36 trillion cubic metres) -- was discovered in 1979 but was only developed with the help of modern technology available to Western majors.
Kazakhstan has been continuing efforts to win back stakes in energy companies it sold to Western firms in the 1990s when oil prices were low.
The operating KPO consortium includes Italy's ENI and Britain's BG Group, which each hold 32.5-percent stakes, along with the US firm Chevron and Russia's private producer Lukoil.
Kazakhstan recently accused the group of violating immigration laws and tax evasion, and in June reported reaching a preliminary agreement for a discounted stake in the field.
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