DOHA: The ongoing Executive Board of the Gas Exporting Countries Forum (GECF) which opened at its headquarters here yesterday discussed the possibilities of setting up a financial institution and a gas institute within the GECF.
The meeting is being hosted by GECF Secretary-General Leonid Bokhanovsky ahead of the forum’s ministerial meeting scheduled to be held in Equatorial Guinea, next month.
Delegations from 12 member countries — Algeria, Bolivia, Egypt, Equatorial Guinea, Iran, Libya, Nigeria, Qatar, Russia, Trinidad and Tobago, Oman and Venezuela — are attending the meetings. The Netherlands and Norway have sent observer members.
The major issues discussed by the EB members were the Programme of Work and Budget for year 2013, which represents the platform of the work of the GECF in general and the Secretariat in particular during the next year.. A number of strategic meetings were also held yesterday like the third High-Level Working Group on the GECF Long Term Strategy, which defines the guidelines for future work of the forum; the third meeting of the Steering Committee a Specialised Body which provides technical advisory to the Secretariat and member countries also met. IllyaGalkin, member from Russia and Cesar Hinestrosa from Equatorial Guinea chaired various sessions. The meeting will conclude today.
The Peninsula