RIO DE JANEIRO (Reuters) – Brazil’s state-controlled oil firm Petrobras believes it may have discovered crude oil in Iranian waters in the Persian Gulf, its international director said on Friday.

Jorge Luiz Zelada said the company would conclude a viability study within three months.
“There are signs of hydrocarbons and we are evaluating the potential,” he said at a press conference in the company’s headquarter city Rio de Janeiro at which he outlined the company’s investment plans abroad.
He said Petrobras has been in Iran since 2004, contracted by the Middle Eastern country to carry out exploration.
Petrobras has drilled twice into the Tusan bloc where oil may be located and has invested around $100 million in exploration. It said the Iran’s regulatory framework as well as the characteristics of the bloc were key to its viability.
Zelada said there was no formal arrangement for Petrobras to be involved in eventual production from the bloc but said the company was discussing “something along the lines of production sharing.”
The director said Turkey would play an important role in Petrobras’s international activity in the next few years with plans to invest around $300 million and produce 100,000 barrels of oil a day there.
Petrobras announced on Jan. 23 that it would invest $174.4 billion by 2013, trumping its previous four-year investment plan which spanned 2008-2012 and totaled $112.4 billion.