The Secretary General of the GECF, HE Mr. Leonid Bokhanovskiy, hosted the 16th Meeting of the Executive Board (EB) at the headquarters of the Gas Exporting Countries Forum (GECF) in Qatar on June 18-19, 2013.
This 16th Meeting was conducted by the Chairman of the Executive Board, HE Mohammed Nasser Al-Hajri, Member from the State of Qatar, and the Alternate Chairman, HE S.M.A. Khatibi Tabatabaei, Member from Iran. The Meeting was attended by 13 Member Countries of the organization namely, Algeria, Bolivia, Egypt, Equatorial Guinea, Iran, Libya, Nigeria, Oman, Qatar, Russia, Trinidad and Tobago, United Arab Emirates and Venezuela, as well as Observer Members Iraq, Kazakhstan, the Netherlands and Norway.
The EB Members discussed preparations for the Extraordinary Ministerial Meeting on June 29, 2013 in Moscow and concluded final arrangements for the 2nd Gas Summit to be held on July 1, 2013 also in Moscow, Russia.
The 2nd Gas Summit in Moscow 2013 comes two years after the 1st Gas Summit in Doha, Qatar. It affords GECF the opportunity to strengthen cooperation among the Member Countries within the organization in accordance with its Statute; to promote debate and exchange of views at the highest level on the gas market and the gas industry, and to project GECF as a platform for dialogue in gas with consumers.
The Agenda and Declaration of the 2nd Gas summit will cover a number of issues including current developments of world gas markets; the situation of the gas industry in general and in the Member Countries in particular; the views of the Member Countries about their energy and gas policies and energy and gas policies of consumers, and the current status and future of GECF.
The EB also discussed the incorporation of Peru as an Observer Member. In less than two years, the GECF has had two new members, namely, Iraq as an Observer Member and United Arab Emirates as Member Country. The Executive Board Meeting will be the last EB Meeting before the 2nd Gas Summit. A report and update of final preparations for the Summit was presented by the HE Ilya Galkin Chairman of the High-level Ad Hoc Group for preparations of the 2nd Gas Summit.