Shafaq News- Al-Anbar

Foreign oil companies operating at Iraq’s Akkas gas field have begun temporarily leaving the site in Al-Anbar province pending a security assessment, a source in the Provincial Council told Shafaq News on Tuesday.

The companies decided to suspend their presence at the field less than two months after starting operational work, and the move will remain in effect until the security situation in the area is reassessed.

Days earlier, the US-based Gulf Keystone Petroleum halted operations at the Shaikan oil field in the Kurdistan Region as a precautionary measures, without specifying how long the suspension would last. A similar move was taken by Dubai-listed Dana Gas and Oslo-listed DNO.

Eighteen Chinese oil experts and workers from the US oil services company Weatherford, operating in the Rumaila oil field also decided to left Iraq “temporarily” through the Safwan border crossing in Basra province, however, a source told Shafaq News that due to a lack of prior coordination with Kuwaiti authorities the group is still at the crossing.

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