Kuwait and Saudi Arabia have been in talks over resuming work at neutral oil and gas zone fields that are owned by the two countries. The fields were halted in 2015 due to a continuous dispute between them, as informed by E&P Magazine.

The fields zone’s output exceeds 470,000b/d of oil. The onshore Al-Wafra field production capacity is around 220mb/d of Arabian heavy crude, while the offshore Al-Khafji field produces as much as 250mb/d.

In December 2016, a source from the oil and gas industry affirmed to Reuters that “the Saudis are telling Kuwait they can restart the Neutral Zone, so potentially another 300,000b/d of crude [could] come on in late Q1 of 2017, or early Q2 2017.”

“Al-Khafji Joint Operations has been told to prepare a startup readiness report,” the source added.

Accordingly, the Kuwaiti Minister of Petroleum, Essam al-Marzouq, confirmed early March that Kuwait is indeed in talks with Saudi Arabia in order to restart output. According to him, the maintenance work at the fields will begin soon.

Al-Marzouq’s statement comes after Chevron Corporation’s decided to appoint Veteran Saudi Executive, Ahmad Awad al-Omar, as president of its operations in Kuwait.