“Russia’s Lukoil has acquired an additional 20 percent from Japan in Eridu and now owns 80 percent of the oil field,” Adil Hashosh, an Iraqi MP from Dhi Qar province, told Rudaw’s Nahro Mohammed.
It contradicts previous media reports that Lukoil had fully acquired the field from Inpex.
The Eridu oil field has been heralded as the major oil discovery in Iraq in the last two decades. Russian giant Lukoil was granted approval to develop the field by Iraqi state-owned Dhi Qar Oil Company in March.
Eridu is one of Iraq’s biggest oil finds in the last 20 years and is located within Block 10, which is located 120 kilometers west of Basra city and 150 kilometers from the massive West Qurna 2 oil field, where Lukoil also operates with a majority 75 percent stake.
According to Lukoil, the oil field is estimated to hold reserves of 12.9 billion barrels.
The development plan of Eridu includes a high of 250,000 barrels of oil per day, a target which is set to be met by 2028.
Iraq and the Kurdistan Region share close economic ties with Russia as a number of Russian oil companies operate both in the Region and in oil fields in southern Iraq. The two countries first established diplomatic relations in 1944. Lukoil, Gazprom Neft, and Rosneft are some of the major Russian oil and gas companies operating in Iraq and the Kurdistan Region.
