MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

India exploring for oil and gas offshore Cuba

India's government owned oil company will explore for oil and gas offshore Cuba following an agreement signed Sunday in Havana.

The agreement between India's Oil and Natural Gas Corporation, ONGC and Cuba Petroleo, CUPET, includes drillings in two of Cuba's maritime blocks, N34 and N35 covering some 4.300 square kilometres in the Gulf of Mexico.

The agreement also gives CUPET the option to acquire 20% of activities undertaken on both blocks, where seismic surveying is scheduled to begin "immediately".

"In the hydrocarbons sector, we firmly believe that Cuba represents a great opportunity for exploration with the possibility of making (energy) finds; we're going to explore this potential" said ONGC director general R.S. Butola.

Fidel Rivero Prieto, head of CUPET said that "we have enormous potential for discovering petroleum and natural gas, and we're certain that if nature has given us those resources, we will be successful with ONGC technological capacity and efforts".

The Indian company has been working in Cuba's Gulf of Mexico waters since June on another project, drilling in six blocs in association with Spain's Repsol YPF and Norway's Norks Hydro.

United States has maintained a unilateral economic, financial and trade embargo on Cuba and the Fidel Castro regime for over 40 years, a key feature of which is the potential for economic sanctions on companies that undertake commercial operations with the island's regime.

However, Rivero said that despite this situation, the Cuban government is keeping its invitation open for U.S. oil companies to invest in Cuba, including the energy sector.