Baku, Azerbaijan, May 20
By Umid Niayesh - Trend:
A spokesperson from Iran's foreign ministry has denied making statements on rumors about China selling information of joint Azadegan oil field to Iraq.
Marzieh Afkham said that Iran awaits official confirmation of the reports which was published on the issue, Iranian IRINN state TV reported on May 20.
Previously Iranian media outlets reported that Chinese have used undisclosed information gathered at Iran's part of the Azadegan field (Majnoon) in Iraq' part of the joint field.
Iran's oil ministry on April 29 officially expelled China National Petroleum Corporation International (CNPCI) from South Azadegan oilfield's development project due a five-year delay in carrying out the project.
China's biggest oil and gas company signed up to develop Iranian oil and gas fields after Japanese and European companies pulled out due to sanctions in the middle of the last decade.
It should be recalled that CNPCI is not a contractor of the joint oil field in the Iraqi sector (Majnoon) despite the claims of the Iranian media outlets.
In the Iraqi sector, Anglo-Dutch multinational oil and gas company, Shell, the operator of Majnoon field project owns 45 percent of the oil field alongside with Malaysia's Petronas (30 percent) and Iraqi Missan Company (25 percent).
When discovered in 1999, Azadegan was Iran's biggest oil discovery in three decades, with 26 billion barrels of proven crude oil reserves in Iran's sector.