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time. “CPECC submitted the best offer [com- pared] to other companies,” he said at the time. “We will pick up the best offer in two months and the work at the Halfaya gas project should start in April 2019.”
China is Iraq’s biggest oil customer, with 10 Chinese firms, including state-owned China National United Oil Corp. (Chinaoil) and Uni- pec, buying 900,000 bpd in 2018.
This is anticipated to grow to 1.45mn bpd this year as trade relations become stronger and Iraq ramps up its production capacity towards 5mn bpd. Last year, Iraq’s state Organization for the
Marketing of Oil (sOMO) also launched a joint oil trading platform with China’s Zhenhua Oil; however, this and the similar set-up with Litasco were recently scrapped, with Baghdad feeling that it had learnt sufficiently from these ventures to go it alone.
Following the rising interest of Russian com- panies in fields throughout Iraq; including West Qurna-2, Badra, Anbar Province and the Kurd- istan Region, it is perhaps unsurprising to see Beijing do “whatever it takes” to ensure that its companies retain a slice of the country’s massive oil and gas pie.
at Qest Qurna-1. Image source: Reuters
Week 48 04•December•2019 w w w . N E W S B A S E . c o m
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