DNO lifts presence with Yemen and Oman deals

DNO International has struck oil deals in Yemen and Oman, widening its footprint in the region.

The company, which merged with the UAE's RAK Petroleum in 2011, successfully bid for a 59.5 per cent stake in Block 84 in Yemen. It will partner with Turkey's Dogan Enerji Yatirimlari Sanayi ve Ticaret and Yemen Oil and Gas Corporation to start appraising the field and drill exploration wells.

In Oman, DNO bought a 75 per cent stake in Block 36 from Allied Petroleum Exploration. DNO will continue evaluating seismic data and drill two exploration wells.

"Block 84 in Yemen and Block 36 in Oman expand our footprint in two core areas in which we have extensive subsurface knowledge and operating history," said Bijan Mossavar-Rahmani, DNO International's executive chairman. "And we are building up our pipeline of exploration prospects with a focus on materiality and early execution."

Current data suggests that the acquired acreage in Oman could hold as much as 100 million barrels of oil.

More than one billion barrels of oil have been discovered in the blocks adjacent to the company's Yemeni acreage, according to DNO.

The bulk of DNO's assets lie in the Iraqi region of Kurdistan, where the company recently announced further oil finds. DNO could raise its production target of 200,000 barrels per day at its Kurdish Tawke oilfield as a result.

Oil production in the autonomous region remains hampered by insufficient payments due to a political stand-off between the central Iraqi government and the Kurdish Regional Government.

In addition, red tape and difficulties in obtaining visas is also hampering efforts to increase production in Kurdistan, a DNO project manager told The National last year.

The company also signed a production sharing agreement for acreage in Somaliland, where it plans to begin drilling for oil next year.