A senior Iranian petroleum official says Tehran has already started talks with Asian and European refineries in a bid to increase its market share.

“Iran is prepared for returning oil exports to the levels before sanctions once they are fully removed,” the director for international affairs of National Iranian Oil Company, Seyyed Mohsen Qamsari said.

The Iranian official reiterated that NIOC has special plans for boosting oil exports after the US-engineered sanctions against Iran are lifted as part of a possible final nuclear deal between Tehran and the P 5+1 group of countries.

Iran’s current oil production is estimated to be around 2.7 million barrels per day of which about 1 million barrels are exported – as required by the current regime of sanctions.

Its major oil customers are China, India, Japan, South Korea and Turkey but the US and European sanctions are preventing international banks from transferring money to the Islamic Republic.

Last month, the country’s petroleum minister said Tehran was ready to increase its oil exports by one million barrels per day a few months after the sanctions against the country are lifted.

Iran holds the world's fourth-largest proven crude oil reserves and the second-largest natural gas reserves.

Iran’s total in-place oil reserves have been estimated at more than 560 billion barrels, with about 140 billion barrels of recoverable oil. Heavy and extra-heavy varieties of crude oil account for roughly 70-100 billion barrels of the total reserves.

By Press TV