Talisman to buy BP assets

Talisman Energy and Ecopetrol SA announced Tuesday they are teaming up to buy BP oil and gas exploration assets in Colombia for $1.9 billion US.

Calgary-based Talisman will pay $858 million US to get a 49 per cent interestin the properties.

Talisman shares closed up eight cents, or 0.5 per cent, to $17.63, on the Toronto Stock Exchange.

Ecopetrol said the partnership is buying all of BP's Colombian assets, including pipelines, gas distribution and current production. It estimated proven and probable reserves in the properties to be the equivalent of 94 million barrels of oil with production of 24,000 barrels per day.

Talismansaid the BP properties are "tremendous assets" that it knows well and it's getting them at a good price.

The deal came two weeks after BP said it would sell properties in Alberta and British Columbia worth $3.25 billion US as part of a largersale of assets worth$7 billion to Houston-basedApache Corporation.

Both sales are to raise cash to pay for the cleanup of and to cover compensation claims from BP's massive oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.

Talisman and Colombian-based Ecopetrol are already partners in several oil and gas exploration blocks in Colombia and Peru.

Talisman's predecessor company was BP Canada.