Archive | 2011

Weekly Security Update for 12th October 2011

Levels of violence fell slightly in Iraq over the past week, with incidents concentrated in Baghdad, Mosul, and an arc stretching from Taji in Salah ad-Din province to Ba’qubah in Diyala province. Ta’mim province also saw a scattering of incidents while there was at least one successful attack and one prevented in Basrah province. The […]

Halfaya Output to Rise in 2012

Output at Iraq’s Halfaya oilfield will rise to 70,000 barrels a day in 2012 with the drilling of 48 wells, As Sabah newspaper said on Tuesday. Bloomberg reports that two projects valued at a total of $187 million will be built next year at the oilfield. The projects include a crude oil processing facility with […]

Gulf Keystone Updates on Ber Bahr Exploration Well

Gulf Keystone Petroleum has announced that the Ber Bahr-1 Exploration Well has spudded on the Ber Bahr block in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq on Monday, 10th October 2011. Ber Bahr-1 is the first exploration well to be drilled on the Ber Bahr block, which covers an area of 208 km² and lies to the […]

Dubai's MAF Eyes Expansion into Iraq

Dubai's Majid Al Futtaim Holding (MAF), sole franchisee of hypermarket chain Carrefour in the Gulf, is to set up a sukuk programme (debt securities structured to comply with the Islamic law) as market volatility continues to thwart its plans for a conventional issue, according to a report from Reuters. MAF completed roadshows for an offering […]

Iraq Infrastructure & Technology Event -- 18-20 Oct

Iraq has the fourth largest oil reserves in the world exporting approximately 96% for the country’s economy, in 2010 100’s of contracts were signed to develop Iraq’s oil and gas infrastructure and increase oil production. Over the last year contract holders have implemented intense geological surveying, drilling, well rehabilitation, security tightening and planning to develop […]

Australia Plans Consulate in Basra

Australia is planning to open a consulate in the oil-rich province of Basra in order to boost Australian-Iraqi business relations in the area, according to a report from AKnews. Australia's Ambassador to Iraq, Lyndall Sachs (pictured), is currently visiting Basra to examine the possibilities for a consulate, as well as for an airline connection. "This […]

Paralysis Hits the Iraqi Parliament

The following article was published on Saturday by Reidar Visser, an historian of Iraq educated at the University of Oxford and currently based at the Norwegian Institute of International Affairs. It is reproduced here with the author’s permission. Any opinions expressed are those of the author, and do not necessarily reflect the views of Iraq […]

Govt to Review Budget due to Oil Prices

Iraq's budget will be reviewed due to changes in oil prices, according to Aswat al-Iraq. MP Haitham al-Jubori said the differences center around the expected price of 85 dollars per barrel, pointing out that the government wanted to set the price at 80 dollars per barrel. This review necessitates sending the budget estimates to the […]

4th Energy Auction to be Delayed

Iraq has delayed its 4th energy bidding round to March 7-8 next year, according to a report from Reuters. "We wanted to give energy companies more time to study the contract terms and also to take into account upcoming holidays like Muslims Eid and Christmas," Sabah Abdul-Kadhim, the head of the legal section of Iraq's […]

Rumaila Output Returning to Normal

Reuters reported on Sunday that output at Iraq's Rumaila South oilfield has been restored to 460,000 barrels per day after pipeline bombings last week. The report said two production stations were restarted on Sunday morning to start pumping 460,000 bpd to Zubair storage, and two more stations would be operating by the afternoon. Output from […]