Rosneft, the Russian state-owned oil company, has increased its investment in Venezuela and reaffirmed its commitment to Kurdistan as it pushes ahead with its biggest international production goals in spite of their political instability.

Igor Sechin, chief executive, has watched as Kurdistan and Venezuela, Rosneft’s largest overseas gambles, have stumbled into default, conflict and political crisis during the past few months.

But Rosneft on Sunday announced that Mr Sechin had flown to Caracas to acquire two new offshore gas blocks, a month after Venezuela, which owes the company $6bn, defaulted on some debt obligations amid the threat of economic collapse.

“For the first time in the history of Venezuela, a foreign company received 100 per cent of the licence,” Mr Sechin said after acquiring a 30-year lease on two blocks containing 180bn cubic meters of gas. “We also got permission for 100 per cent export of output, which is very important for us.”

The company has also reaffirmed its commitment to drilling and infrastructure projects in Iraq’s disputed region of Kurdistan, despite political instability, outbreaks of military conflict, and anger in Baghdad.

“In terms of Iraqi Kurdistan, we are obviously moving forward on the projects and we are actually quite excited about that opportunity,” said Pavel Fyodorov, the company’s first vice-president. “It is a manifold opportunity that has infrastructure and production components to it.”

Rosneft’s investments in Venezuela and Kurdistan are seen as critical financial lifelines for the governments of both, and have been viewed by analysts as geopolitically influenced moves by the Kremlin-backed company to advance Russia’s influence in their respective regions.

“The company is very stretched at the moment, and appears to be spinning many, many plates at the same time,” said a senior analyst at an international financial adviser. “It all revolves around [Mr] Sechin.”

Investors are becoming increasingly alert to Rosneft’s balance sheet after the splurge on international projects and acquisitions swallowed up its cash flows and increased leverage.

Free cash flow in the third quarter of this year fell 83 per cent to just Rbs8bn, while a more than doubling of liabilities during the past year to $60.4bn has seen its ratio of assets to liabilities shrink dramatically during the past 12 months to 0.52 from 1.17.

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But the oil and gas on offer in both countries are key to the company’s strategic goals of expanding output by 30m tonnes of crude equivalent by 2022 — a roughly 10 per cent production jump in five years — diversifying away from legacy oilfields in Russia and expanding into gas.

“Overall, we are doing the business of searching for the best possible bargains for Rosneft shareholders. Opportunities are opportunities,” said Mr Fyodorov.

While declining to give updates on specific investments, Mr Fyodorov said that all projects in Kurdistan — including spending $400m on five production blocks, financing a new gas pipeline and funding upgrades to the country’s oil export pipeline — were proceeding as announced.

“Kurdistan has, in our view, a fairly exciting economic proposition in place. It has very high-quality geological reserve and there are fairly low costs associated with the production,” he said. “The terms that have been offered to us are remarkably value-accretive to Rosneft shareholders.”

Rosneft is the world’s biggest listed crude producer, but lags well behind the market value of western rivals.

But in recent years Mr Sechin, who is a long-time aide and confidant of Russian president Vladimir Putin, has sought to expand outside Russia and become a global competitor. This has included setting up a trading operation, buying refining assets in Germany and taking control of India’s Essar Oil in a $12.9bn deal this year.

The company, which is 50.1 per cent owned by the Russian state and counts BP, Glencore and Qatar’s sovereign wealth fund as shareholders, has also started drilling at a deposit in the Black Sea, which it owns in partnership with Italy’s ENI.

“According to [Mr] Sechin, the strategy will bring an additional $3bn in free cash flow,” said Kirill Chuyko, head of research at BCS Capital Markets in Moscow. “We consider it to be achievable, since Rosneft has a number of greenfields already launched or awaiting launch.”

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