Algeria is considering all the options on the assets which oil major BP wants to sell, including acquiring them for itself or letting another firm buy them, official media quoted the energy minister as saying on Sunday.
Russian oil company TNK-BP wants to buy BP's assets in Algeria, which include stakes in two major gas-producing fields, but Algerian state energy firm Sonatrach has the right of first refusal.
BP's Algerian interests are among a number of assets around the globe it has put up for sale to help pay for the Gulf of Mexico oil spill earlier this year.
Sonatrach is "studying all the options, whether that's a case of BP deciding to sell its assets to another party, or whether it (Sonatrach) would buy those assets in part or in whole," the official APS news agency quoted Energy and Mines Minister Youcef Yousfi as saying.
BP is one of the biggest foreign investors in Algeria's energy sector. The North African Opec member supplies about 20 percent of Europe's natural gas needs and is the world's eighth-biggest exporter of crude oil.
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