The embattled country is also targeting production of 4.5 million barrels a day by end of 2013, the officials said. Iraq sits on the world’s third largest oil proven reserves, totaling more than 115 billion barrels.

Oil Ministry officials are close to concluding negotiations with several major oil companies to help redevelop five big oil fields – Missan, West Qurna – Phase One, Zubair and Rumaila in the south and Kirkuk in the north – which Iraq’s Oil Minister Hussein al-Shahristani has said would increase output by 500,000 barrels a day.

Officials involved in these talks have said Iraq is likely to sign these deals, known as Technical Support Agreements, or TSAs, with Royal Dutch Shell PLC (RDSB), BP PLC (BP), ExxonMobil Corp. (XOM) and Chevron Corp. (CVX) in the next few weeks. French oil major Total SA (TOT) has joined through Chevron.

Anadarko, leading a consortium of Vitol Holding and the United Arab Emirates’ Dome, has also joined these talks, the officials said. They are looking to develop Subba/Luhas oil field in southern Iraq.

Thanks to a moderate improvement in Iraq’s security situation in the last few months, exports have risen. Flows through the northern export pipeline to Turkey have become more reliable, after being the target of sabotage and technical problems for much of the time since the U.S.-led invasion in 2003.

Since September 2007, Iraq has been pumping crude from its northern oil fields to Turkey at a rate of 300,000 barrels a day.A shipping agent said last week the rate was now 480,000 barrels a day. However, that level cannot be maintained because of a lack of storage capacity assigned to Iraq crude in Ceyhan.

Many oil companies have registered to be qualified to bid to help develop one of the world’s prized oil fields. Oil Ministry spokesman Assem Jihad said 70 oil companies filed their registration documentation to the oil ministry but al-Shahristani said lately that 115 firms had registered.

In February, the minister said Iraq would announce firms that are eligible to compete for oil fields development in March. Iraq is also planning to issue the first round of tenders to develop its vast oil fields during the second quarter of this year, he said.

The TSAs Baghdad wants to sign with oil majors are seen as a stopgap until a national oil law is ratified. A draft oil and gas law, which will allow foreign companies to invest in the Iraqi oil sector, is still under debate at the Iraqi parliament. Ratification of the law is one of the key targets set by the U.S. administration.

The TSAs would be signed under the framework of Iraq’s Saddam-era hydrocarbon law.

Iraq is one of the 13 members of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries, though it has been exempt from the group’s quota system since the late 1980s.

Source: Hassan Hafidh, Dow Jones Newswires; + 962 799 831 831; hassan.hafidh@dowjones.com