Experts believe that the valuable investment in extraterritorial refineries by Iran will undoubtedly be one of the priorities of the Ministry of Petroleum in the new Iranian government.

One of the key reasons for ensuring petroleum sales is the guaranteed market creation through principled commercial policies such as shareholding in extraterritorial refineries. According to analytical data, in recent years, Iran has moved away from traditional market creation, which faced restrictions due to sanctions, towards guaranteed market creation through cooperation in extraterritorial refineries.

Reconstructing these refineries means creating a market for Iranian crude oil without sanction limitations. However, Iran has not yet fully succeeded in implementing this strategy. The principles of Iran's Sixth Development Plan and its policies aim to maximize the use of domestic capabilities and self-reliance. Given the current sanctions and the lack of sufficient foreign currency resources to invest in building new refineries, Iran should focus on exporting technical and engineering services to other countries and cooperating in equipping existing refineries abroad.

Experts argue that building extraterritorial refineries is Iran's latest path to presence in global markets. The biggest challenge in this area is how to finance it. This is the same experience that countries like Saudi Arabia have successfully used to secure a reliable market for their petroleum.

According to available statistics, Saudi Arabia is confident about selling 60 to 70 percent of its crude oil and has no concerns about reliable export markets, because this amount of petroleum is consumed in refineries where Saudi Arabia is a shareholder or in refineries wholly owned by the country. It is worth mentioning that building refineries outside Iran's borders is not a new concept. Even before the Islamic Revolution, this policy was part of Iran's agenda.

For instance, the largest crude oil refinery in South Korea was owned by Iran. In South Africa and India, an Iranian large company had also invested in the petrochemical and refinery sector. Unfortunately, all these assets were sold, and the proceeds were used to cover the salaries and operational costs of the previous Iranian government. There is no doubt about the benefits of such investments. This policy is correct in terms of continuous and comprehensive access and export, reducing risk, and mitigating the impact of sanctions.