MOSCOW: BP said it would press ahead and sell a stake in its Russian venture, dismissing a threat by its billionaire partners to block a deal that would help the Kremlin tighten its grip on the country's vast energy sector.
The British oil major said last Friday it would pursue a sale after receiving expressions of interest in its one-half stake in TNK-BP, Russia's third-largest oil producer. Analysts say BP's shareholding is worth $30 billion.
Sources familiar with the matter said BP has been approached by state energy holding company Rosneftegaz, which controls a stake of more than 75 percent in Rosneft, Russia's largest oil firm.
A successful sale of TNK-BP to the state would raise the government-controlled share of Russia's oil output to half and strengthen Vladimir Putin's grip on strategic natural resources weeks after his return to the presidency.
It would also sideline the four billionaires in the AAR shareholder consortium who own the other half of TNK-BP and thwarted an earlier tie-up between BP and Rosneft.
"We have a contractual right to sell," a BP spokesman said in response to a media report that AAR would seek to veto any deal.
BP's announcement of its sale plans triggers a clause in the TNK-BP shareholder agreement that allows it to negotiate with any buyer within 135 days - nearly five months - sources familiar with the matter said.
During an initial period of up to 45 days, AAR would have the right to express an interest in buying BP's stake. That would be followed by good-faith negotiations over 90 days, during which time BP would also be able to hold talks with other possible buyers.
The sequencing puts the ball in the oligarchs' court for six weeks before BP can start talks with any other suitor.
The BP spokesman dismissed a report in the Financial Times that the shareholder agreement barred BP from giving out any confidential information to a third party without AAR's consent, effectively handing the co-owners a veto right over any deal.
"We will meet our obligations under the shareholder agreement and expect Alfa-Access-Renova (AAR) to do the same. We look forward to hearing from AAR directly," the spokesman said, adding that sale talks could take several months.
A source close to AAR said it was considering buying BP's stake. "Now that BP has sent its notice, AAR has the priority right to require BP to negotiate in good faith a purchase by AAR of TNK-BP shares from BP," the source said.
"Effectively, this right creates a 135-day moratorium on any sale by BP of its TNK-BP shares."
BP and AAR have been at odds for years, with relations dogged by failed deals and legal challenges.
In a further twist on Monday, a Russian court ordered a new hearing into a $13 billion lawsuit brought against BP by minority shareholders in TNK-BP over the failed BP-Rosneft deal, a BP lawyer said.
The Federal Arbitration Court in the Siberian city of Tyumen has sent the case to a lower court, lawyer Konstantin Lukoyanov said, adding the decision "inflicts substantial damage on Russia's investment climate". No date was set for the hearing.
AAR has denied being a party to the minority lawsuit.
Former deputy premier Igor Sechin, a Putin ally who has led strategy at Rosneft for the best part of a decade, was recently named CEO of Rosneft and nominated to the Rosneftegaz board with a mandate, sources say, to build an oil major of global scale.
Gazprom Neft — an oil unit of state gas export monopoly Gazprom that has a joint venture with TNK-BP — may also emerge as a bidder for BP's stake, analysts said.
Gazprom CEO Alexei Miller, speaking in Malaysia, said the company had held no talks with BP but added that "everything is interesting to us", the Interfax news agency reported.
Analysts at Renaissance Capital led by Ildar Davletshin also said an exit by BP from TNK-BP may not lead to its departure from Russia.
"If BP sells its stake to one of the Russian national oil companies, it could simultaneously strike a new deal with a buyer to create a new joint venture, and commit to reinvest part of its gains back in Russia," the analysts wrote in a note.
BP, tied by an exclusivity clause in the TNK-BP shareholder pact, has missed out on a raft of offshore exploration deals announced in recent weeks by Rosneft with US Exxon Mobil, Italy's Eni and Statoil of Norway.
The state approach has put AAR — led by banking-to-retail tycoon Mikhail Fridman — under pressure after it took legal action last year to prevent BP from signing the offshore exploration and $16 billion share-swap deal with Rosneft.
Fridman resigned as chief executive of TNK-BP a week ago, deepening a corporate governance crisis that has deprived its board of a quorum and blocked the payment of dividends.
Industry and political sources say the oligarch shareholders last year lobbied Dmitry Medvedev, then president and now prime minister, to oust Sechin as chairman of Rosneft.
With Putin back in the Kremlin and Sechin in control of Rosneft in both an executive and advisory capacity, it appears increasingly likely that the state will assume control of TNK-BP — either by buying out BP or the oligarchs.
"The end game is that the state buys (TNK-BP)," said one veteran Moscow-based executive. "The issue is that Fridman overplayed his hand a couple of times."
Sources close to AAR have said, meanwhile, that the consortium would be willing to buy out BP for a consideration of $25 billion.
BP paid a total of $8 billion in 2003 for one half of TNK-BP, a hugely profitable, if troubled, investment that has paid $19 billion in dividends and accounts for 29 percent of its output.
BP says oligarchs can't block Russian stake sale
BP says oligarchs can't block Russian stake sale
Saudi youth turn to AI for art and culture
- Creativity, heritage and technology converge in a new generation of artists
RIYADH: As Saudi Arabia’s Vision 2030 places creativity, culture and technological innovation at the core of national development, the impact of these priorities is becoming increasingly visible across a wide range of disciplines and practices.
Through the use of artificial intelligence, young Saudis are integrating technology into their creative work both as a practical tool and as a medium in its own right. In doing so, they are expanding their capabilities, exploring personal and collective identity, and finding new ways to preserve and reinterpret cultural heritage.
“AI gives young Saudis a new way to interact with their own cultural inheritance,” said Dmitry Zaytsev, founder of Dandelion Civilization, a platform designed to help individuals shape unique professional paths.
“Traditional design elements such as calligraphy or geometric motifs were once difficult to modify. Experimentation required resources and formal approval. AI removes that barrier and makes exploration immediate. A creator can test many versions of a pattern and see which ones still feel authentic to them,” he told Arab News.
According to Zaytsev, this emerging form of expression does not signal a rejection of tradition, but rather a deeper engagement with it. “The young creator discovers what can change and what must remain constant. AI becomes a sketchbook that allows culture to evolve through curiosity rather than fear. When creators correct a model or push it toward local rhythm, they strengthen rather than dilute cultural identity,” he explained.
Sarah AlBaiz, an art adviser, researcher and artist, uses code to blend visual art with concepts drawn from culture and philosophy. While her early practice focused primarily on painting, her trajectory shifted during the 2020 AI Artathon, a pioneering international event highlighting collaboration between humans and machines in artmaking, where she discovered how to merge her engineering background with her creative work.
DID YOU KNOW?
• Saudi youth are using AI as a creative tool to reinterpret heritage, from calligraphy to folklore.
• AI is helping artists experiment faster without the traditional barriers of resources or formal approval.
• The Kingdom is backing creative AI nationally, with programs like SAMAI aiming to empower 1 million Saudis for an AI-driven future.
Operating within the field of computational creativity, where technology actively participates in the artistic process, AlBaiz explores themes of finance and faith. “Because they’re two sides of who I am,” she said. “When you talk about values, for example, that is both a term used in finance and trade from an objective perspective, but also moral and spiritual value.”
“When you understand prompting in AI, you can get it to produce almost anything. But it’s also informed by the training data it has,” she said.
Rather than relying on a single platform, AlBaiz experiments with multiple AI models to test their limitations and audience reception. “I work a lot with language as well, so large language models are right up my street when it comes to computational creativity.”ee
Her work has gained international recognition. At the 2022 Islamic Arts Biennale in Jeddah, she co-created an artwork under the banner of Super Artistic AI that generated Al-Qatt Al-Asiri motifs from southern Saudi Arabia. The piece received an Audience Award.
Beyond her artistic practice, AlBaiz is developing an intelligent art advisory system aimed at helping users navigate the Saudi art landscape. Designed as an initial point of contact, the system would guide users through potential pathways before they engage with a human adviser.
“It’s about understanding what role AI plays in the pursuit of what you want,” she said. “When I decided to focus on Qantara and building the advisory, I recognized that many of the systems required would need to be intelligent systems that offload a lot of work from me and the team.”
“When AI is an enabler rather than the end result, it becomes less intimidating because it feels risk-free for the end user,” she added.
Zaytsev echoed this idea, describing AI as a kind of rehearsal space. “Young people practice conversations, explore sensitive topics and organize their thoughts without social risk. This builds emotional clarity and confidence,” he said.
While generative tools such as large language models attract much of the attention, AI’s creative applications extend far beyond text and image generation.
Fairooz Alawami, trained as both an architect and engineer, uses AI to create self-expressive visual works inspired by dance.
“My practice is focused on contextualizing movement,” she said. “Because of my architectural training, I work with 3D modeling software called Rhino, which includes a visual coding language. Within that environment, you can also write code in Python, JavaScript or C#.”
Alawami employs OpenPose to analyze videos of her dancing by mapping points across her body. She then applies another computer vision model, MIDAS, which converts images or videos into depth frames. “If OpenPose gives me a skeleton, MIDAS gives me depth,” she explained. The resulting data is fed into 3D modeling software, where it is refined and manipulated into finished artworks.
She began dancing at a young age. “I didn’t find it, it found me,” she said. Movement later became the foundation of her artistic practice, leading to her first major project around three years ago while completing her master’s degree using the Grasshopper plugin. At the time, the workflow was slow and fragmented, but the arrival of ChatGPT helped streamline the process by making it easier to write and learn code.
“I think my love for dance and my love for art and design came together in a way that felt uniquely me,” she said. “Once I found that space, I just ran with it. It is my singular voice.”
Her work also draws heavily on cultural and musical heritage. One recent project was inspired by folklore referenced in the iconic song “Al Leila wa Leila” by Umm Kulthum. Alawami extracted musical stems from the track and mapped them to characters within the narrative. “The vocals were Shahrazad, the storyteller, and each stem represented a different narrative element,” she said. Earlier works were influenced by Islamic architecture and the geometric patterns found throughout Saudi Arabia and the wider Arab world.
“There are some incredible artists using generative AI to do very impressive things, and I don’t think I fall into that camp,” she said. “For me, AI is more like a skills-gap tool that helps me reach where I want to go.
“As humans, whether we realize it or not, the act of creating feeds us in some way. Lowering the barrier to entry makes creativity less intimidating.”
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Today, Saudi Arabia’s creative sector is supported by expanding national infrastructure. Initiatives such as the Cultural Scholarship Program place Saudi students in more than 60 universities worldwide, spanning disciplines from archaeology and literature to design, filmmaking and culinary arts. In parallel, the Kingdom launched the SAMAI initiative last year, aiming to equip 1 million Saudis with the skills needed to engage confidently in an AI-driven world.
Within Vision 2030, culture, tourism, digitalization and AI are treated as strategic sectors rather than peripheral concerns. As Saudi Arabia develops its creative economy as a form of soft power, its youth are becoming increasingly digitally fluent. AI tools are now embedded within creative workflows, enabling a new generation to explore heritage, remix traditional aesthetics and develop narratives that resonate on a global stage.
