Iraq has announced plans to build a new refinery in the Kirkuk region of the country that will boast a capacity of 150,000 barrels per day, reported Reuters.

The oil ministry has put the final touches on project as per the latest global standards, stated the report citing the Oil Minister Thamer Ghadhban.

Several Iraqi ministers visited Kirkuk this weekend to meet the governor of the province and discuss new projects and plans that have stalled, some of which were in the oil and electricity sectors.

Ghadhban stressed the importance of Kirkuk to the Iraqi federal government, reported OilPrice.com.

Last November, Iraq resumed oil exports from the Kirkuk province, a year after it had stopped oil flows from the area due to a dispute with the semi-autonomous Kurdistan region, it stated.

Weeks before the resumption of the Iraqi oil exports from the Kirkuk province, the Kurdistan region said that it had upgraded its oil export pipeline, boosting its capacity to 1 million bpd from 700,000 bpd, to accommodate future production growth from the region, it added.