Chinese company OKs deal on Sudan oil

SHANGHAI, China – China’s No. 1 oil company, CNPC, and Indonesia’s PT Pertamina have agreed to co-develop a Sudanese offshore oil block, ignoring international efforts to isolate Sudan over the crisis in its Darfur region, a report said Monday.

The agreement, signed Thursday in Sudan’s capital, Khartoum, calls for a six-year exploration phase and shared future oil production under a 20-year concession, the CNPC-backed China Petroleum Daily reported.


Sudan is among Beijing’s key oil suppliers. It shipped 4.7 million metric tons of crude oil to China in January-May, a fivefold increase over the same period in 2006.

Much of that oil comes from equity owned by state-owned CNPC, or China National Petroleum Corp., in Sudan.

AP