Northern is pleased to advise shareholders that ATI Oil Plc (“ATI”), its joint venture partner in Italy, has today announced the final decree of a further two Italian licences in which Northern has a 50% interest.

The full text of the ATI release is as follows:

“ATI is pleased to announce that it has been advised by its partner, Northern Petroleum (UK) Limited (“NPUK”), that the Italian authorities, having accepted the required environmental impact studies, have issued the final decree of a further two Italian licences in which ATI has a 50% interest.

The licences confirmed are the re-designated G.R18.NP (formerly d19GR.-NP) and G.R19.NP (formerly d20GR.-NP), both of which are located offshore adjacent to the recently decreed licence G.R17.NP and close to the Tunisian boundary, in the west of the productive Sicilian oil province.

A strategic move has been undertaken to license the 2850 sq km area in these three licences covering the Apennine-Maghreb thrust belt offshore in Italian waters, believed to offer the potential for finding very large fields. To the east, this thrust belt contains the giant Val d’Agri oil field in the southern Appenines and the more than 1tcf Gagliano gas and condensate field in central Sicily. To the west in Algeria is the Tellian fold belt, where it is known as the Atlas thrust belt.

Finance Director, Chris Foss, commented:

ATI is delighted to have received the final decrees of these two licences that are adjacent to the recently decreed G.R17.NP licence. A speculative 2-D seismic survey was recently undertaken by PGS over the same thrust belt in the adjacent Tunisian waters. Our work on reprocessing existing seismic data continues, and the joint venture is considering the recording of new trial seismic lines if, as anticipated, PGS records a 3-D survey over the offshore Tunisian part of the thrust belt.”

Further enquiries:

Northern Petroleum Plc
Graham Heard, Exploration Manager
Chris Foss, Company Secretary
Tel: 020 7743 6080

Hansard Communications
Chris Roberts/Ben Simons
Tel: 020 7245 1100