LUKOIL president met Prime Minister of Iraq

Prime Minister of Iraq Haider Al Abadi held a meeting with PJSC LUKOIL President Vagit Alekperov in Baghdad.

It was also attended by the Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of the Russian Federation to the Republic of Iraq Maxim Maximov. Parties discussed several issues related to LUKOIL projects in the country.

PJSC LUKOIL President informed Prime Minister of Iraq on the progress of negotiations with Iraqi Ministry of Oil and Basra Oil Company regarding the Addendum # 3 to the Service contract and Final Development Plan for the West Qurna-2 oilfield providing increase of production from Mishrif formation to 450 kbpd and start of production from Yamama formation in the amount of 350 kbpd, as well as on the Block 10 progress.

Prime Minister approved the work of LUKOIL in Iraq and supported all the initiatives for LUKOIL’s projects including drilling three new appraisal wells in Block 10 and expanding the cooperation between LITASCO and SOMO in the field of trading Iraqi crude exports and supply of petroleum products into Iraq.

Contract for development of West Qurna-2 oilfield was signed in 2010 for a period of 25 years. The project achieved first oil production in March 2014. The field has added the largest incremental production growth in Iraq of 400,000 bpd, and today is producing at a rate of 385,000 bpd from the Mishrif formation, which represents 9% of the total Iraqi production of crude and 12% of Iraq’s exports. During a meeting between PJSC LUKOIL President and the Iraqi Minister of Oil in August 2017 it was agreed that the production will reach 800,000 bpd by the end of 2024.

Block 10 is LUKOIL’s second project in Iraq’s upstream sector where in February 2017 a commercial discovery was announced of the Eridu oil field. This discovery is the largest discovery of oil in Iraq during the last twenty years with recoverable reserves in excess of 2.5 billion bbls of crude.

LITASCO has been operating a trading Joint Venture with SOMO for the last twelve months with 2 million bbls of crude being traded every month, enabling Iraq to start selling its crude on CIF basis (delivered to direct buyers) as opposed to FOB (delivered at Iraqi export ports).