Russian-Syrian Business Council meets in Damascus
ITAR-TASS, 10.05.2010
DAMASCUS, May 10 (Itar-Tass) – The Russian-Syrian Business Council gathered for its jubilee 10th meeting in Damascus on Monday several hours before Russian President Dmitry Medvedev’s first official visit to Syria.
The businessmen are discussing new promising and mutually advantageous projects. An agreement is expected to be signed during the forum on a loan for the construction of a joint tourist centre on the Syrian coast of the Mediterranean Sea.
Tourism is a growing and promising field of bilateral partnership that has traditionally focused on power generation, oil and gas, equipment supplies, agriculture, and waterworks.
About 100 economic facilities have been built in Syria during the years of cooperation, many of which have been national economic flagships.
“The local market holds a lot of promise,” Stroytransgaz top manager Alexander Ryazanov told Itar-Tass.
He said the Russian company was ready to build gas and oil pipelines in Syria.
For several months the two sides have been negotiating for the restoration of the strategic Kirkuk-Banias oil pipeline that used to supply Iraqi oil to the Syrian terminal on the Mediterranean.
“This is a very important project, and we are ready to examine the pipe and restart it. The re-commissioning of the oil pipeline will be very helpful for the two neighbouring Arab countries,” Ryazanov said.
Another Russian company, Tatneft, and Syria’s General Petroleum Corporation commissioned the first well at the South Kishma oilfield on April 26. Tatneft was the first to have started commercial oil production in Syria on a PSA basis. The field is believed to contain 4.9 million tonnes of oil.
