FEBRUARY 4, 1998. - LUKOIL President Vagit Alekperov visited Romania on February 2-3. The visit was related to company plans of expanding petroleum product sales in Romania and other East and Central European countries.

As reported earlier in mid-January a LUKOIL subsidiary - LUKOIL Europe Ltd. - won a tender for the purchase of a 51% stake in Petrotel refinery in Ploesti, one of the biggest of 11 Romanian refineries. It produces motor fuels, lubricants and additives as well as petrochemicals. The yield of product from crude oil is 85-87%. The personnel was a little over 5,000 in 1997. The company plans to pay special attention to the state of the environment in refining areas.

Since September 1997 LUKOIL has delivered some 400,000 tonnes of oil to RAFO refinery in Onesti. Besides, it annually imports Romanian equipment worth up to $10 million for its plants.

"On the whole LUKOIL regards Balkan countries and in particular Romania having significant oil reserves as a strategic partner in oil refining. It is interested in the strengthening of its position in the Romanian processing sector. Romania is expected to play a significant role in refining of the steadily increasing amount of Caspian oil delivered through port Novorossiisk and the transportation of petroleum products to Central and Eastern Europe. Thus, involvement in the refinery privatization complies with LUKOIL downstream expansion plan which is an important task for the Company. I hope our appearance in Romania will be appreciated by the Romanian public because such cooperation, I think, stimulates positive economic processes in our two countries," Alekperov said.

In Romania the LUKOIL president attended the signing of an agreement with the Romanian State Property Fund on the purchase of a stake in Petrotel and a letter of intent on the expansion of cooperation between LUKOIL and the Romanian government. The LUKOIL delegation also attended the international economic forum Romania at the Crossroads which dealt with the promotion of projects of transporting Central Asian and Caspian through Romania to Europe. The subject was also the focus at Alekperov's meeting with the president and prime minister of Romania.

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