ABSTRACT
The Caspian oil sector, however, was confronted with several handicaps in the 1990s. First of all, offshore prospecting was delayed for several years by disagreements over delimitation of national territories and by domestic wrangles over selling exploration rights to foreign fi rms possessing the technology needed to explore the offshore fi elds. Second, the existing pipelines were controlled by a Russian enterprise, Transneft, which overtly discriminated against non-Russian oil.2 After the dissolution of the USSR, the government of Kazakhstan took over the state’s share in the TengizChevroil joint venture, but Russia claimed rights to part of the oil and also controlled the pipeline about whose access no commitment had been made in the original agreement.3 In Azerbaijan, development was hindered by war with Armenia in 1992, but after a ceasefi re had been agreed the government moved swiftly to complete the ‘deal of the century’ by which foreign companies would develop the country’s oil.
