Russia's LUKoil said is negotiating with one of the companies interested in the privatisation of Romania's national oil company, SNP Petrom, with a view to taking over the company.

"A company from the short list is negotiating with us about entering a participation to buy Petrom. LUKoil is not directly participating in the privatisation of Petrom," said Nicolae Ciornii, President of LUKOil DownStream.

Ciornii did not disclose the name of the company involved in negotiations, only saying that it is not a Russian company. "Out of Petrom's assets, we are interested in the processing and distribution, but we have no interest for the extraction segment," Nicolae Ciornii added.

At the end of last year, Hellenic Petroleum, Hungary's MOL and US-based Occidental Oil and Gas Holding Corporation started to asses Petrom data. Italy's ENI announced in early December that it would not lodge a binding bid for the 33.34% stake in the firm.

Trade ministry officials added that the firms still competing for the Petrom stake were: Occidental Oil and Gas, Russia's Gazprom, Poland's PKN Orlen, Greece's Hellenic Petroleum, Hungary's MOL, Austria's OMV, Switzerland's Glencore.

(NewsBase 26.i.04)