During a visit to the West Qurna II oilfield in Basra, Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi reiterated his government’s commitment to ensuring the security of the southern oilfields and their workers. He met with senior management of the Russian operator Lukoil, following protests by locals demanding jobs.

ERIELL, an international oilfield service group, has signed a contract with LUKOIL Middle East for drilling of 25 producing wells at the West Qurna-2 field in Iraq.

Iraq boosted crude shipments in March to the highest level in more than three decades, adding to a global supply glut that has helped push down oil prices by 46% in the last year.

Oil supplies in Iraq and Russia surged to the highest level in decades, signaling no respite in early 2015 from the glut that has pushed crude prices to their lowest in five years.

OPEC will need to “step in” amid further declines in oil prices, which are fair at about $70 to $80 a barrel, according to the group’s second-biggest producer.

After years of friction, the two sides last week struck a deal in which Kurds will give half of their overall oil shipments to the federal government and Baghdad will pay overdue civil servants' salaries in the region.

"The lifting of sanctions on Iran would be a game changer for world gas market," said Dr Seyed Mohammad Hossein Adeli, secretary general of the Gas Exproting Countries Forum, Zawya news website has reported.

Crude oil would cost at least $150 a barrel due to supply disruptions in the Middle East and North Africa were it not for rising production in North Dakota and Texas

Kuwait Energy makes oil discovery on Iraq’s Block 9

ShaMaran Petroleum resumes oil production in Kurdistan