Shell was in talks with Chinese oil companies on a possible bid to develop oil fields in Iraq, Jeroen van der Veer, CEO of Shell Group, said in Beijing onTuesday.

He told reporters here that Shell was in the process of forming partnerships with Chinese oil companies in Iraq, and expects to bid on the projects in late June or early July.

He declined to tell which potential partners Shell was talking to or which fields they might bid on.

Officials in charge of media affairs from China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC) and China Petrochemical Corporation (Sinopec), the country's largest two state-owned oil titans, said they did not know whether they were potential partners with Shell.

Jeroen van der Veer said that Shell had an interest in developing oil refineries in China.

Compared with other countries of the world, there were huge opportunities for Shell in the Chinese market, he said.

According to Peter Voser, Shell's capital expenditure for 2009 is expected to reach 31 or 32 billion U.S. dollars, nearly the same as last year. Shell plans to maintain an annual output growth of two- to- three percent from 2009 to 2012.

Peter Voser will take the post of Jeroen van der Veer as CEO of Shell Group from July 1.

(Xinhua News Agency April 14, 2009)