Iran and China's Sinopec could, as early as Sunday, sign a final multi-billion dollar agreement for the development of the Yadavaran onshore oil field, the Iranian oil minister said.
"Iran could probably sign a contract this evening with China's Sinopec to develop Yadavaran," Oil Minister Gholam Hossein Nozari told reporters on the sidelines of an oil conference.
"If not today, it will be in two weeks time. We are still in talks," he said.
In late October 2004, Iran and Sinopec inked an initial agreement to develop the Yadavaran onshore field, southwestern Iran, which is estimated to hold more than three billion barrels of recoverable crude.
Based on that memorandum of understanding, China was to have a 51-percent share in the project. But Nozari refused to disclose the final financial details.
The agreement also involves China's purchase of an annual 10 million tons of Iranian liquefied natural gas for a 25-year period to start in 2009.
Iran and China have significant economic ties and Beijing is the second largest importer of Iranian goods after Japan.
China is a veto-wielding permanent member of the UN Security Council and has until now been reluctant to fully support a US-led drive to impose a third set of UN sanctions against Tehran over its nuclear programme.
The United States has been pressuring European and Asian countries to cut their business ties with Iran as another lever to pressure the Islamic republic in the atomic standoff.
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