Iraqi Oil Deal with CNPC May Be Done by Weekend

Iraq's Oil Minister Hussain al-Shahristani will visit Beijing at the end of this week to conclude a contract to develop the Ahdab oil field with a unit of China National Petroleum Corp, an official at the ministry said.

The contract may be signed after al-Shahristani meets officials from China National's Al Waha Petroleum Co unit, the official, who declined to be identified for security reasons, said by telephone on Tuesday. The government has said the Ahdab field in southern Iraq may produce about 90,000 barrels a day.

If concluded, China National will be the first foreign company to win exploration rights from the central government in Baghdad since the United States-led invasion in March 2003, Bloomberg News said.

China's largest oil producer was awarded the field in 1997 and Iraq is renegotiating contracts that former President Saddam Hussein's regime had signed with international oil companies. Iraq has this year been negotiating technical service contracts with companies such as BP Plc, as it seeks to boost output to levels attained before the war.

Al-Shahristani plans to visit Poland today and travel to China from there, the Iraqi oil ministry official said. Liu Weijiang, a spokesman for China National's overseas projects, declined to comment by mobile phone from Daqing in northeastern China.

The 1997 production-sharing agreement between China and Iraq has been converted into a US$1.2-billion service contract, the Al-Noor newspaper cited al-Shahristani as saying on Monday, Reuters reported on Tuesday.