BP's agreement done with the Russian energy group Rosneft might give rise to a rift with shareholders in its other partnership in Russia, TNK-BP.

A group of Russian billionaires called Alfa-Access-Renova who is the owner of the other fifty percent of TNK-BP, stated that according to one phrase in their joint venture it is needed that BP and AAR follow up all opportunities in Russia only through TNK-BP. Officials of AAR stated that AAR believed that it therefore had the right to veto BP's agreement with Rosneft.

Yesterday labor's leader, Ed Miliband, criticized BP's joining up with Rosneft in Britain; it got criticized by and environmental campaigners as well.

Miliband said that the agreement which allows BP for accessing huge oilfields in Russia's Arctic waters, was concerning because it came at a time when the British company was still grappling to recover from the explosion of its rig in the Gulf of Mexico which claimed eleven lives and caused the most devastating environmental disaster in American history.

He is pretty concerned about this, s told by Miliband to BBC's Andrew Marr Show. He thinks the lesson of the Deepwater Horizon, the Gulf oil spill, should give the lesson to all and it is the task for the government, private companies and so on, not to go on digging and digging deeper and deeper for oil. The task is to figure out alternative forms of energy that can help the country advance in a clean way.

BP and Rosneft squared up a strategic pact on Friday in which both the firms would exchange expertise to explore Russia's Arctic region. The areas cover about one hundred and twenty five thousand square kilometers near the South Kara Sea. The two companies will also exchange five percent of BP shares for nine and a half percent of Rosneft.