"It is very important to reduce the costs of energy projects, we will see if we can get acceptable terms, but frankly today the terms offered today (in Iran) are not attractive enough," Christophe de Margerie told delegates. "Because of the unsatisfactory conditions, Total was never able to strike a real deal for the South Pars project," de Margerie said.
Last month Iran accused Total of wasting time and said that a new partner would enter the South pars project with a leading share.
Total has a memorandum of understanding with the state-owned National Iranian Oil Company to develop Phase II of the South Pars field but the project has been overshadowed by haggling over contract terms.
But Yves-Louis Darricarrere, Total's head of exploration and production, said "slow" negotiations were ongoing with Iran.
"I am not dragging my feet but we need to work on those agreements as the terms needs to be attractive enough to work," Darricarrere told reporters on the sidelines of the conference.
Many agreements were needed for such huge projects, which were complex and sophisticated, he said.
"You need an agreement for the upstream plant, on the plant itself and you need to know under which condition the gas will be supplied from upstream to downstream," Darricarrere said.
Many western majors such as Total had come under pressure to stay out of Iran from the French governemnt and the previous U.S. administration, which sought to isolate Tehran over its nuclear programme. (Reporting by Muriel Boselli and Ikuko Kao, Editing by Peter Blackburn)
