BAGHDAD (Reuters) -- Iraq said it had removed the Siba gas field in southern Basra province from a list of 11 gas and oilfields to be offered later this year in a second bidding round for development contracts.

Abdul-Mahdy Al-Ameedi, deputy director general of Iraq’s contracts and licensing directorate, said Iraq would move ahead with the offer of 10 other sites, some comprising a group of several fields.
“There were 11 fields, but the Oil Ministry last week decided to exclude the Siba gas field in Basra ... The reason is that this was considered a small field that the (state-run) South Oil Company can develop itself,” Ameedi told Reuters.
Ameedi and Iraq’s Oil Ministry spokesman scotched rumours that oilfields to be offered in Iraq’s north had been removed from the list due to a long-running row over land and authority between the Shi’ite-Arab led government in Baghdad and the Kurdistan Regional Government in northern Iraq.
“That news is incorrect and has no basis in fact. Whoever spread this has their own agenda,” Ameedi said.
An executive from a global oil company, speaking on condition of anonymity, said that he had heard from the ministry that five northern fields would be removed from the list.
“I don’t know why but I guess it might be to reduce tensions ahead of the elections in the north. It might be an attempt by the oil ministry to help deal with the Kurds,” he said.
No date has yet been set for the second round of bidding for contracts to develop Iraq’s vast oil and gas fields, but the auction is expected to take place before the end of the year.
“Up till now there has been no change in the second bidding round, and there has been nothing from the Oil Ministry on this issue,” said Oil Ministry spokesman Asim Jihad, referring to the northern fields.
Iraq has the world’s third largest oil reserves, and a first bidding round for contracts last month was the first time they had been opened up to foreign developers in decades. However, foreign oil majors -- whom Iraq says it needs to rehabilitate its battered oil sector after years of war -- balked at what they said were strict terms, and only one contract was awarded to a group led by BP.