Iran, Russia, Qatar to form natural gas cartel

The Iranian Oil Minister, Gholamhossein Nozari, declared on Tuesday that discussions with the Gazprom general manager, Alexei Miller, and the Qatar Oil minister lead to a possible future cartel of the world’s largest natural gas exporters, similar to OPEC, Mediafax informs.

Iran, Russia and Qatar control the planet’s most important natural gas reserves, Russia being the main provider for Europe, including for Romania. Gazprom provides, via interim distributors, about one third of Romania’s natural gas consumption.

„We took important decisions. The creation of a natural gas OPEC is demanded and there is a consensus in this matter”, said the Iranian official.

Europe and USA warned repeatedly that a natural gas exporters’ cartel would endanger the global energy security and would help price manipulation.