Iraq launched an unprecedented public campaign Friday to attract investment from international oil companies, rolling out a red carpet - literally - for executives from as far away as Russia and Japan.

At the expo - the first of its kind since the fall of Saddam Hussein more than five years ago - the oil minister pronounced his country now safe for business. He said it desperately needs help in rebuilding its devastated oil infrastructure, developing oil fields and refineries and looking for new sources of untapped crude.

"Tens of billions of dollars are needed for investment in the oil sector in the coming 10 years," Hussain al-Shahristani told reporters at the opening of the three-day energy conference in an unfinished convention center in the tightly secured area surrounding the Baghdad International Airport.

In return, al-Shahristani promised "full cooperation and a transparent and competitive environment for fair business."

Despite the violence and the hassles that continue to plague Iraq, the foreigners seemed interested.

Nikolay Seregin, project director for Gazprom Neft, a Russian company at the conference, said the world financial crisis and plummeting oil prices make Iraq particularly attractive because of the low cost of doing business here.

"At this time, when all oil companies are experiencing difficulties, Iraqi projects may be more interesting," he said.

A drop in oil prices to under $50 per barrel from a summertime high of $150 has also hit Iraq hard. The crisis forced the government to slash next year's spending plan from $80 billion to $67 billion. Iraq, an OPEC country, is heavily dependent on oil revenues for more than 90 percent of its budget.

The Iraqis recently opened a first round of bidding for contracts to develop six major oil fields and two gas fields, choosing 34 of 120 oil companies that applied to participate.

Those chosen included Royal Dutch Shell PLC, BP PLC, ExxonMobil Corp., Chevron Corp. and Total. None of those major companies was among the dozens of groups manning booths at the Baghdad conference. But the expo did attract ConocoPhillips, the third-largest U.S. oil company along with several Russian and Japanese companies.

Several private security companies also advertised their services at booths, a reminder of the continued dangers of doing business in Iraq.

"We understand that the security in Iraq is improving," said Yasushi Kono, executive vice president for Nippon Oil Exploration Ltd., a Japanese company chosen for the bidding process.

"So we think it is high time for the Japanese enterprises to come to Iraq and help Iraq people to reconstruct the energy industry in Iraq," he added. "Opportunities are abundant."

Other companies, including Lukoil and Gazprom Neft of Russia and Indonesia's Pertamina, are looking to renew ties they enjoyed under Saddam's regime.

China recently signed a $3 billion deal to develop the Ahdab oil field south of Baghdad, restoring a Saddam-era contract that was canceled after the invasion.

Iraq sits on the world's third-largest proven oil reserves with more than 115 billion barrels.

But decades of wars, U.N. sanctions and aging infrastructure have depleted the oil infrastructure, while insurgent attacks and sabotage have undermined rebuilding efforts since the March 2003 U.S.-led invasion.

"These factors have combined to keep our petroleum sector in prison in a 1970 time capsule, isolated from the many advances in technology that the industry has made," al-Shahristani said.

But he touted the remarkable security gains that have led to a sharp decline in violence over the past year following a U.S. troop buildup.

"Now the government is looking to the sector as a critical engine for future growth and economic development," he said.

He also said much of Iraq's vast oil wealth has yet to be tapped, with only 15 of 78 known oil and gas fields developed and brought into production.

Many desert areas in western and southern Iraq also have yet to be explored, raising the potential of undiscovered resources.

Al-Shahristani said no field exploration work has been conducted in Iraq since 1990, when the U.N. imposed punishing sanctions following Saddam's invasion of Kuwait, which led to the 1991 Gulf War.

Iraq hopes to raise the current daily production of 2.4 million barrels per day to 6 million barrels per day in 2018, al-Shahristani said. He also cited the need to increase transportation, storage and refining capacity as production increases.

The inability of Iraq's fractured ethnic and sectarian groups to agree on national oil legislation for the equitable distribution of oil revenues has been another major frustration for companies looking to invest.

Most of Iraq's known oil wealth is concentrated in the northern semiautonomous Kurdish region and the mainly Shiite south.

The Kurds have unilaterally signed more than 20 production-sharing contracts with a handful of international oil companies - a move that has drawn warnings from the central government that the contracts are illegal.

The conference itself underscored the problems still facing the country. It originally was to be held in October but was pushed back to December because the conference center wasn't ready. Some delegates also complained of long waits at checkpoints getting into the area, one of the most heavily secured in Baghdad.

"Questions of security and instability in the country are very important," Seregin said.

Hussain al-Uzri, the chairman of the government-owned Trade Bank of Iraq, acknowledged continued challenges but said "the presence here of major oil companies is a very good sign that Iraq is now on the radar screen of international investors."

Iraq's Oil Ministry has agreed to resume oil sales to the South Korean company SK Energy after the company withdraws from a contract with the Kurds, an official said Saturday.

The Oil Ministry suspended oil exports to South Korea's SK Energy and several other international firms to protest deals they had signed with the semiautonomous Kurdish government in northern Iraq.

But the decision will be reversed since South Korea's leading oil refiner has informed the Iraqi government that it plans to withdraw from the contract with the Kurds, Falah al-Amiri, the head of the state oil marketing arm SOMO, told The Associated Press. He gave no timeframe.

"The company officials have said that they will not be involved in any commitments apart from the federal government," al-Amiri said in an interview at a three-day energy conference that began Friday in Baghdad. "Oil shipments will be allocated for this company in the near future."

SK Energy could not immediately be reached for comment.

The Iraqi federal government suspended crude exports to South Korea's leading oil refiner in January on grounds that South Korean companies had not abandoned a deal signed in November with the Kurdish administration to develop a disputed oil field.

The Kurdish regional government in northern Iraq has signed more than 20 oil deals with foreign firms to work in Kurdish-controlled fields since it drafted its own oil and gas law in August 2007.

The Shiite-led Iraqi central government says the deals are invalid with no national oil law in place.

SK Energy is part of a consortium led by the state-run Korea National Oil Corp. that signed a package of oil deals with Kurdish authorities last year.

Kurdish authorities played down concern about the decision.

"The deal between this consortium with the Kurdish regional government is still valid and the withdrawal of one company is not a matter of concern to us," spokesman Falah Mustafa said.

The Kurds, whose territory sits on top of vast reserves, argue the Iraqi constitution gives them the right to unilaterally negotiate and sign oil deals, without consulting with the central government in Baghdad.

The Oil Ministry, however, considers those agreements illegal and has warned it will exclude and blacklist companies that sign deals with the Kurds.

A Kurdish rebel group on Sunday declared a nine-day holiday cease-fire in their fight against Turkey, a spokesman said, calling it a "first step toward peace."

The unilateral cease-fire will begin Monday as the Muslim holiday of Eid al-Adha gets under way, according to Ahmed Deniz, a spokesman for the Kurdistan Workers' Party, or PKK, which has bases in northern Iraq.

He said the group's military and political leadership would like to resolve its conflict with Turkey peacefully.

"The military and political leadership of the PKK announces a nine-day, unilateral cease-fire ... which is considered a first step toward peace," Deniz told The Associated Press.

Turkey has ignored a series of PKK cease-fire declarations in the past, vowing to fight until all militants are killed or surrender.

The rebels are fighting for autonomy in the predominantly Kurdish-inhabited southeast Turkey. The fight has claimed the lives of tens of thousands of people since 1984.

Iraqi victims of a deadly shooting last year in central Baghdad demanded the harshest penalty Monday for the Blackwater Worldwide guards charged in the case, saying punishment is needed to keep other security contractors from acting with impunity.

The case has been thrust back into the spotlight more than a year after the Sept. 16, 2007, shootings that killed 17 Iraqi civilians as five Blackwater guards were charged with manslaughter, attempted manslaughter and using a machine gun in a crime of violence.

Hassan Jabir, a lawyer who was driving through the square on his way to court when the shooting occurred, said the indictments were a vindication.

"They kept on claiming and bragging that they were acting in response to an attack, but today, the truth was shown," he said.

Witnesses and an Iraqi investigation said the shooting on Nisoor Square was unprovoked, but Blackwater has said the guards were acting in self-defense after they were ambushed.

The five, who surrendered Monday at a federal courthouse in Salt Lake City, face the prospect of 30-year mandatory prison terms. A sixth guard admitted in a plea deal to killing at least one Iraqi in the shooting.

Samir Hobi, a 41-year-old taxi driver who was wounding in the shooting, said he hoped for a more severe penalty to prevent other security contractors from acting with impunity.

"I do not know about U.S. law, but I think that they should receive death sentence because they killed innocent people and thus it should be an eye for an eye," Hobi said.

Hobi is among several Iraqis whose lives were turned upside-down when the Blackwater guards opened fire in west Baghdad's Nisoor Square.

The taxi driver said he was injured in the leg when his car was sideswiped by the Blackwater SUVs, which were driving in the wrong direction.

"They began shooting randomly without any cause. I remained inside my car and could not leave because I saw those who were leaving their cars were being killed," he said. "I want them to get the harshest punishment so that such an incident will not be repeated."

Hobi said the incident left him traumatized and he still must wrap up his leg in order to walk.

"I have visited shrinks. The incident was horrifying," he said. "Now I cannot sleep and if I do, I have nightmares about the incident."

The shooting became a flashpoint for Iraqis long angered over what they perceived as heavy-handed behavior by private security contractors, who enjoyed blanket immunity. A new U.S.-Iraqi security pact that takes effect on Jan. 1 lifts that immunity, although it will be retained for on-duty American troops and contractors working with them.

Khalid Ibrahim said his father Ibrahim Abid, a 78-year-old gardener, was killed when he was caught in the shooting while driving home. Ibrahim said his mother was overwhelmed by grief and died six months later.

"The indictment of the Blackwater members is a good news for us because the killers must pay for their crime against innocent civilians," he said.

The 40-year-old electrician said the family had received $30,000 in compensation but that could not make up for the fact that their lives had been devastated.

"Justice must be achieved so that we can have rest from the agony we are living in," he said. "We know that the conviction of the people behind the shooting will not bring my father to life, yet we will have peace in our minds and hearts."

The shooting unfolded in a crowded square, where prosecutors say civilians were going about their lives, running errands. The heavily armed Blackwater convoy sought to shut down the intersection following a car bombing elsewhere in the city.

Many victims said they also were part of a civil lawsuit being brought against Blackwater. The Moyock, North Carolina-based company is the largest security contractor in Iraq and protects U.S. diplomats in Iraq.

A senior Iraqi police official, meanwhile, said U.S. prosecutors will travel this week to the capital to meet with survivors and relatives of those killed. The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he wasn't authorized to release the information, did not provide details.

Another taxi driver, Sami Hawas, was injured in his chest, leg and left eye, but he's more concerned about his 6-year-old diabetic son who went into shock after seeing his father laid up in the hospital and still suffers from the trauma.

He said he had received $14,000 in compensation but that was insufficient.

"The people behind the Nisoor Square attack should receive the harshest verdict and we should be given the fair compensation. The money that was given to me did not even cover the treatment expenses," the 42-year-old said.