BAGHDAD -- Iraq, concluding its second post-war bidding round on Saturday, awarded seven oil-field contracts out of 10 offered to international oil companies.
Two of the awarded oil fields are Iraq's supergiant Majnoon and West Qurna Phase 2. Each holds more than 12 billion barrels of oil reserves. West Qurna Phase 2 was awarded Saturday to a consortium consisting of Russia's second-largest oil company, Lukoil Holdings, while Majnoon was awarded to Royal Dutch Shell PLC and Malaysia's state-owned Petronas.
Halfaya oil field, with reserves estimated at 4.1 billion, was awarded to China National Petroleum Corp., Petronas and France's Total.
Iraqi Oil Minister Hussain al-Shahristani told reporters Saturday that production capacity from the seven awarded oil fields could reach 4.7 million barrels a day.
Mr. Shahristani also said Saturday that his country is ready to rejoin the quota system of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries when the time is right. He said "it could be quite some time before we reach the required level of production" to rejoin the quota regime.
Iraq is a member of OPEC, the producer group that pumps about 40% of the world's oil, but isn't bound by its quotas.
via online.wsj.com
so the country who sent it's soldiers to die to liberate this place from a dictator and was libeled internationally will not benefit from any of these oil deals
