Pakistan's economy expanded 4.2% in 2016, foreign investment has continued to grow -- attracted by the multi-billion dollar China-Pakistan Economic Corridor project -- and improvements in the country's security front, following the government's efforts to combat terrorism, have also led to economic gains and additional investment.

Crude oil flows from the Kirkuk fields in northern Iraq were briefly disrupted on Thursday after a Kurdish faction seized a pumping facility in protest at the policies of Baghdad and Erbil, adding a new threat to Iraq’s attempts to comply with Opec’s agreed cuts.

Iran will begin exporting 100,000b/d of crude oil to Russia within the next two week, Iranian Minister of Petroleum Bijan Zangeneh said.

Iran's crude oil and condensate exports rose 3% month on month in January as it continued to regain market share, widening its appeal among refiners around the globe in the process.

"Over the course of the past year, Iran and Venezuela had very close stances and we were supportive of each other in many instances," said the Iranian official.

Iranian Minister of Petroleum Bijan Zangeneh says Iran's crude oil output is at 3.9 million barrels per day.

The Tapi pipeline is projected to export up to 33bn m3 of natural gas a year from Turkmenistan to Afghanistan, Pakistan and India over 30 years. It was earlier scheduled to be operational in 2019 but, because of delays in achieving financial closure, the pipeline's first gas flows from Turkmenistan are now scheduled for 2020. The much delayed project was formally inaugurated on December 13, 2015.

Pakistan LNG Limited opened the financial bids for the supply of 240 shipments of LNG January 19. Gunvor has bagged a five-year contract to supply 60 shipments while Eni has been awarded a 15-year contract to supply 180 shipments.

Pakistan LNG Limited will open financial bids for the supply of 240 shipments of LNG on January 19, while contracts to successful bidders will be awarded on Jan 31.

For the year, the world's third biggest oil consumer bought about 473,000 barrels per day (bpd) of oil from Iran to feed expanding refining capacity, up from 208,300 bpd in 2015, the data showed.

Iraq plans to raise crude exports from its southern port of Basra to an all-time high in February, keeping exports high even as OPEC production cuts take effect this month.

The most important challenge facing Iran and all the Iranian technical and professional elite is high recovery of coefficient, he said, adding that raising the recovery coefficient by one percent will result in 700 billion barrels or let's say seven billion barrels; seven billion barrels with an oil sold for 50 dollars per barrel means 350 billion dollars more wealth for the country.

Iraq is fully committed to delivering on OPEC’s Nov. 30 agreement to reduce supplies, Oil Minister Jabbar al-Luaibi said Thursday in Cairo at a meeting of the Organization of Arab Petroleum Exporting Countries, known as OAPEC.

Iraq plans to increase crude-oil exports in January, government records show, immediately raising questions about its commitment to slashing production in line with OPEC’s landmark production agreement last month.

Oil, gas and petrochemistry are major topics of economic discussions between Iranian and Indonesian officials during the Indonesian president visit to Iran.