They will also take charge of public relations and liaise with governments in their regions.
A CNPC representative declined to comment. "The idea is to add a horizontal layer of management to better coordinate, supervise and manage CNPC's global businesses," said one of the sources. The new offices have a combined staff of more than 100, including some transferred from existing business units, two of the sources said. CNPC produces some 2 million barrels of oil equivalent with top investments in countries like Kazakhstan, Sudan, Chad, Iraq, Australia and Canada. Like its peers Sinopec and CNOOC , CNPC has in recent years scaled back its overseas expansion as an anti-corruption drive since President Xi Jinping took power in 2012 reined in big-ticket spending. CNPC, parent of PetroChina , has instead shifted to a re-examination of assets to manage losses while setting its sights on resource nations with which Beijing maintains friendly relations, such as Qatar and the United Arab Emirates. However, some company officials were sceptical of the benefit of the changes. "There have been many flip-flops over the years regarding CNPC's global organizational structure," said the third official.
"I'm not convinced what these new regional offices could actually achieve other than a 'supervisory' function." (Reporting by Chen Aizhu; Editing by Florence Tan and Robert Birsel)
aizhu.chen.reuters.com@reuters.net))