BP received a third payment for its investment in Iraq's supergiant Rumaila oilfield when a tanker loaded 2 million barrels of light crude at the southern oil hub of Basra on Tuesday, a shipping source said.

The vessel B Elephant started loading on Saturday and finished on Tuesday, the shipping source at the port said.

BP's partner at Rumaila, China's CNPC, also received a third payment when the vessel Tenki left Basra port on Dec. 8 carrying two million barrels of Basra light crude, the shipper said.

BP received two payments for the millions of dollars it has invested in Rumaila in May and July. CNPC started to get paid in May.

Rumaila, the workhorse of Iraq's oil industry, has some 17 billion barrels in estimated crude reserves and usually pumps around 1.2-1.3 million bpd, which is almost half of Iraq's output.

BP and CNPC are owed more than $1 billion for work at Rumaila over the past year or so, where production has been increasing.

BP and CNPC have been developing the Rumaila field as part of Iraq's ambitious plans to expand its oil industry to extract the billions of dollars it needs to rebuild tattered infrastructure after years of war and sanctions.-Reuters