ALMATY, Kazakhstan -- Foreign oil companies exploring the Caspian Sea shelf off Kazakhstan are worried by a recent Russian statement claiming that Moscow has veto power over the Caspian's resources, a top Kazakh official said Tuesday.


Baltabek Kuandykov, President of Kazakhstankaspiyshelf, or KCS, the state-owned partner of the foreign consortium, said that negotiations were continuing on rights over the sea's resources and work remained on schedule.


"Of course such a position of Russia worries participants of the consortium, but I must say that our position is in accordance with world standards on the demarcation of sea territories," Kuandykov said in an interview. "The work of the consortium is going ahead according to schedule."


A Russian Foreign Ministry spokesman said in May that all parts of the Caspian Sea belonged to all countries bordering the landlocked water -- Russia, Kazakhstan, Azerbaijan, Turkmenistan and Iran.


Any exploitation of the sea's resources could go ahead only with joint approval, the spokesman said.


The statement threw into disarray projects by Kazakhstan and Azerbaijan with foreign oil companies to drill potentially huge fields in parts of the Caspian they considered their own.


But the Azeri leader Haydar Aliyev said he had received assurances from Prime Minister Viktor Chernomyrdin that Moscow did not intend to block any Azeri deal.


The foreign companies in the consortium with KCS are Agip, Mobil, Shell, British Gas, Total and the BP/Statoil alliance.


"Our opinion is that the Caspian Sea, like all other seas, should be divided into territories down the central line between the countries around the sea," Kazakh oil official Kuandykov said.