BLOOMBERG: French Employee at Shell's Russian Venture Is Killed (Update1): “A French expatriate working at a Royal Dutch Shell Plc-led oil and gas venture off Russia's Pacific coast was killed at his apartment in Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk, on the southern end of Sakhalin Island.”: “Sakhalin Energy and Starstroi are investigating the murder, in part ``to learn how to improve safety and security'' for other employees…”: Wednesday 20 July 2005

July 20 (Bloomberg) -- A French expatriate working at a Royal Dutch Shell Plc-led oil and gas venture off Russia's Pacific coast was killed at his apartment in Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk, on the southern end of Sakhalin Island.

The employee of OOO Starstroi, a pipeline contractor for the Sakhalin-2 project, ``died following a criminal incident at his apartment,'' Ivan Chernyakhovsky, a spokesman for the project operator, Sakhalin Energy Investment Co., said in a telephone interview from Moscow today.

The victim, a Frenchman born in 1956, was stabbed six times in his rented apartment, Interfax reported, citing Tatiana Kutuzova, a senior aide to the Sakhalin regional prosecutor.

The consulate is dealing with the procedures to recover the man's body and inform his family in France, said a diplomat at the French Embassy who asked not to be identified. The man was found today.

Sakhalin Energy and Starstroi are investigating the murder, in part ``to learn how to improve safety and security'' for other employees, Chernyakhovsky said.

Shell is tapping fields off Sakhalin Island to meet rising demand for fuel in Asia and North America. Deliveries of liquefied natural gas to Asian clients will be delayed by about eight months to about the middle of 2008 as the costs for the second and main part of the project may double to $20 billion, Shell announced last week. The first phase cost $2 billion.

Sakhalin Energy has sales commitments for as much as 83 percent of its expected 9.6 million-ton-a-year LNG output.

Sakhalin Energy will also delay for about six months into 2007 the start of year-round oil production.

The company has faced difficulties arranging financing with the European Bank of Reconstruction and Development over environmental problems with the company's planned undersea and overland pipelines.

To contact the reporter on this story:

Torrey Clark in Moscow at tclark8@bloomberg.net.

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=10000085&sid=aMyGd54k7Av4&refer=europe 

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