Rosneft has announced that Taieb Belmahdi, a former Qatar Energy official, will now become chairman of the Russian company’s board.
Belmahdi has “45 years of experience in major energy companies in the Middle East,” Rosneft said in a statement.
Two other Qataris, Faisal Alsuwaidi and Hamad Rachid Al-Mohannadi, representing the Qatar Investment Authority, have also joined the board, the energy giant said.
After Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, German society put enormous pressure on G. Schroeder to cut ties with V. Putin and the largest Russian energy companies.
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, who, like G. Schroeder, represents the Social Democratic Party, repeatedly and publicly urged the former leader to give up his work in Russia.
The German parliament has decided to revoke Schroeder’s privileges as a former chancellor.
And the EU legislators, in a separate non-binding resolution, called on him to impose sanctions if the former chancellor does not want to give up profitable seats on the boards of Russian companies.
78-year-old Mr. Schroeder was supposed to join the supervisory board of another energy giant, Gazprom, in June.
Although G. Schroeder, who served as German Chancellor in 1998-2005, condemned Russia’s invasion of Ukraine as unjustified, he stated that the dialogue with Moscow must continue.