On October 18, Kurdish authorities inked a deal with ExxonMobil for it to explore six areas in Kurdistan, but Baghdad regards as invalid any contracts not signed with the central government.

"A representative of Exxon met with Shahristani at the end of February," Faisal Abdullah, spokesman for Iraqi Deputy Prime Minister for energy affairs Hussein al-Shahristani, told AFP.

"The company will give its response and its decision in a couple days. Now we are waiting for Exxon's final decision."

The Kurdistan contract potentially puts an Exxon contract with the Iraqi government in jeopardy.

In January 2010, Iraq's oil ministry completed a deal with ExxonMobil and Anglo-Dutch giant Shell to develop production at West Qurna-1, which with reserves of about 8.5 billion barrels is the country's second-biggest field.