"The recent acquisition of a share in the Sicilian refineries strengthens our position in talks with Venezuela as processing of Venezuelan oil at this refinery is possible and could be profitable," said Kuzyaev. Last month LUKOIL entered the west European refining busine s by forming a joint venture with Italy's second largest refiner ERG. The venture will control ERG's Sicilian refining complex with combined capacity of around 320,000 barrels per day. LUKOIL, one of the most active Russian investors in foreign energy assets, entered Venezuela in 2005 by signing an initial agreement on geological exploration at the Junin-3 deposit, to date its only project there. Kuzyaev, who is also the head of LUKOIL Overseas division, said that geological work has been practically completed and the company was awaiting the government's decison on whether to let it into a joint production project.