Russian delegation to arrive in Islamabad today to discuss oil and gas deal — official

ISLAMABAD: A high-level Russian delegation is due to arrive in Pakistan Wednesday, confirmed a senior official in Islamabad, to discuss the possibility of supplying discounted oil and liquefied natural gas (LNG) to the country and attend an inter-governmental meeting on bilateral trade and technical cooperation.
Pakistan has been negotiating with Russia to ensure uninterrupted energy supply and cut down the cost of gas and petroleum products which surpassed $23 billion in the last financial year and constituted 29 percent of the country’s total imports.
According to the Pakistan Bureau of Statistics, Islamabad has already procured $7.7 billion of energy products from the international market during the ongoing economic year.
“A big Russian delegation, led by energy minister Nikolay Shulginov, will arrive in Islamabad on January 18 to attend the eighth session of Pakistan-Russia inter-governmental commission [IGC] on trade, economic, scientific and technical cooperation to be held on 19th and 20th January,” Sumra Abbas, a spokesperson for the government’s economic affairs division, told Arab News on Tuesday.
She informed the Pakistan delegation would be headed by economic affairs minister Sardar Ayaz Sadiq during the IGC talks.
Qazi Imran-ud-Din, deputy secretary at the petroleum division of Pakistan’s energy ministry, said both sides would also discuss technical cooperation in oil and gas fields and the Pakistan Stream Gas Pipeline (PSGP) project.
“The Russian delegation will discuss bilateral cooperation in diverse fields,” he continued. “Our ministry will negotiate with them over the import of oil and gas, PSGP project and cooperation in exploration sectors.”
He added it was “unlikely” that any agreement or deal would be signed between the two countries during the upcoming visit while expressing hope the negotiations would take forward many issues which needed to be addressed for import oil and gas from Russia.
“During the visit, the negotiations will focus on ways and means of dealing with the sanctions regime, shipping cost, insurance cover and mode of payments,” Imran-ud-Din informed while referring to international sanctions faced by Russia in the wake of its war with Ukraine.