Iran, Iraq sign swap oil deal
Iraq's Oil Minister Jabar al-Luaibi said that Tehran and Baghdad have signed an agreement to export Kirkuk's oil to Iran.
Jabar al-Luaibi said in a statement that under the agreement 30 to 60 thousand barrels of oil will be exported to Iran from Kirkuk's oil fields every day.
The agreement with Iran was signed by the Iraqi State Organization for Marketing Oil (SOMO), he said.
Under the swap deal, Kirkuk's oil will be transferred by tanker trucks to the border point near Kermanshah, and the Iranian side will deliver Iraq the same amount of oil with identical specifications and quality via the southern ports of the two neighboring countries.
Meanwhile, SOMO's director general Alaa al-Yassiri said that the agreement opened a new export gateway for Iraq that is useful for the country's economy and will boost Iraq's economic ties with its neighbors.
Previously, Iraq's oil minister had said that SOMO was negotiating with Iran on the date of beginning the export of oil from Kirkuk to Iran's Kermanshah refinery.
Iraq in November exported 105.06 million barrels of oil (3.502 million bpd). The Iraqi Ministry of Oil announced that it was planning to increase its daily production to 5 million barrels of oil by the end of this year.