| 2008: Iraq Extends Oil Registration |
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January 22, 2008 Iraq has extended until Feb. 18 a deadline for international companies to register to bid for a role in developing some of the nation's prized oil fields, the Oil Ministry said Tuesday. Early this month, the ministry asked companies to submit by Jan. 31 all necessary registration documents to allow them to bid for the oil fields development. "It has been decided to extend the deadline to Feb. 18 instead of Jan. 31, considering the New Year's holidays and the needed period to prepare theses documents," the ministry said in a statement. Iraq, the holder of the world's third-largest crude oil reserves with an estimated 115 billion barrels, aims to boost crude production to 3 million barrels per day by the end of this year. Potential bidders must present tax, legal and work records, including lists of upstream projects for the past five years, production rates and investments. Iraqi oil officials said recently they hoped to issue tenders to develop the country's vast oil fields at the beginning of 2008. They said the Oil Ministry was preparing contract models for the first group of oil fields. The Iraqi parliament is currently considering an oil law to divvy up the country's oil and gas among Shiites, Sunnis and Kurds _ one of the benchmarks sought by the United States to achieve national reconciliation. The Feb. 18 extension came as the Iraqi Oil Ministry and four international oil firms are gearing up for another round of negotiations scheduled for later this week in Jordan. Those follow initial meetings late last year. BP, Chevron, Exxon Mobil and Royal Dutch Shell submitted technical and financial proposals in December for five active fields and have already received counterproposals from the Iraqi side, an oil official said. |