16 January 2008 Iraqi Oil Minister Hussein al-Shahristani has followed up on threats to punish companies that sign deals with the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) by canceling the memoranda of understanding (MOU) some had inked with his ministry, a ministry source told International Oil Daily from Baghdad Tuesday. This is the first concrete step toward depriving them of any future deals with Baghdad. Al-Shahristani had persistently told companies that Baghdad…
Tag: Exxon Mobil
Iraq: China’s Breakthrough
29 August 2008 China this week became the first country since the overthrow of Saddam Hussein to clinch an oil deal with Iraq, by reviving the first of a series of contracts signed by the previous Iraqi regime under new terms dictated by new realities. The service contract for development of the Al-Ahdab field, which includes a mix of old production sharing elements and new service contract terms, sets a…
Iraq: Paralysis At The Top
8 August 2008 More than nine months after they were first launched, Iraq’s technical support contracts (TSC) — the first commercial agreements with Big Oil since nationalization in the 1970s — are in limbo. The official view from Baghdad is that the short-term deals are losing their relevance due to protracted negotiations and the possibility that they will overlap with the award of long-term service contracts under the recently launched…
Iraq: New Models
14 March 2008 After struggling for five years to restore crude oil production to prewar levels, Baghdad is taking a pragmatic look at ways to involve international oil companies in developing its resources, sidestepping an internal debate over whether production sharing agreements (PSA) — the model preferred by Big Oil — are suited to Iraq. While discussions are ongoing with international oil companies, and between the Iraqi oil ministry and…