Japan sold in a tender about 90,000 kl, or around 565,000 barrels, of Khafji crude from the shared Neutral Zone between Saudi Arabia and Kuwait from government stocks in Kagoshima in southern Japan, an official at the trade ministry said on Monday.

The Khafji crude is scheduled to be loaded between July 21 and Aug. 20 and will be taken on a ship chartered by the government to a another terminal located in Japan.

It marks the second month in a row that Japan has sold Khafji crude from its strategic stockpiles.

In a separate tender, also opened earlier on Monday, Japan is still considering if it will sell about 300,000 kilolitres, or around 1.9 million barrels, of Kuwait crude from tanks it rents at the Okinawa Oil Base (OCC).

A bid was submited for the lot but it did not meet the preferred price of the trade ministry, the government official said. A decision on the tender award is expected by the end of this week.

OPEC member Saudi Arabia and Japan are discussing an agreement under which the Saudis would put millions of barrels of crude oil in free commercial storage in Okinawa.

Both tenders are part of a plan by the ministry to sell several thousand kilolitres of crude oil from its strategic reserves in the fiscal year ending next March as it aims diversify the types of petroleum it holds.