By B Izzak & Agencies

KUWAIT: Kuwait and Saudi Arabia said Thursday they have sole ownership of a disputed gas field also claimed by Iran, in an escalating feud after Tehran threatened to pursue exploration. The offshore field, known as Durra in Kuwait and Saudi Arabia and Arash in Iran, has long been focal point of contention between the three countries. The Kuwaiti and Saudi authorities said in a joint statement published on Thursday that “they alone have full sovereign rights to exploit the wealth in that area”.

The two Gulf states renewed “their previous and repeated calls to the Islamic Republic of Iran to negotiate” the demarcation of their maritime borders to settle the issue. Oil Minister Saad Al-Barrak also refuted Iran’s claims, reiterating that the offshore field is entirely and jointly owned by Kuwait and Saudi Arabia. In a reply to a parliamentary question, Barrak said “Iran’s claims regarding the field cannot deny the true reality on the ground, which confirms that the field is jointly owned by Kuwait and Saudi Arabia”.

He said the Durra gas field, which was discovered in 1967, is entirely located in the divided maritime zone between Kuwait and Saudi Arabia, adding this indicates “they alone have the full rights to exploit natural resources in the region”. Barrak said in the reply that Kuwait and Saudi Arabia signed an agreement in March 2022 to jointly start the development of the field through one company and its production capacity is expected to reach one billion cubic feet and 84,000 barrels of condensates daily.

Barrak said in statements last week that Kuwait and Saudi Arabia would commence drilling and production from the field without waiting for a demarcation deal with Iran. The two countries have held many rounds of negotiations in the past several decades to demarcate the maritime borders, but all have failed. Iran claims that it has rights to the field and a few weeks ago threatened to start drilling unilaterally if no settlement was reached with Kuwait to demarcate the maritime borders.

“Iran will pursue its rights and interests regarding exploitation and exploration” of the field “if there is no desire for understanding and cooperation”, Iranian Oil Minister Javad Owji was quoted as saying by the official Shana news agency. Last month, Kuwait had invited Iran for another round of maritime border talks after Tehran said it was ready to start drilling in the field. The row over the field stretches back to the 1960s, when Iran and Kuwait each awarded an offshore concession, one to the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company, the forerunner to BP, and one to Royal Dutch Shell.

The two concessions overlapped in the northern part of the field, whose recoverable reserves are estimated at some 220 billion cu m. Meanwhile, Minister of Foreign Affairs Sheikh Salem Al-Abdullah Al-Sabah received the credentials of newly-appointed Iranian Ambassador to Kuwait Mohammad Totonchi on Thursday. During their meeting, the two sides discussed Kuwaiti-Iranian relations. Totonchi handed Sheikh Salem a letter from his Iranian counterpart Hossein Amir-Abdollahian, which included an invitation for an official visit to Iran.