French oil and gas giant Total has pulledout of a deepwater block in offshore Oman after failing to make commerciallyattractive discoveries, a senior Omani official told reporters on Monday.

Nasser Al Aufi, undersecretary at theMinistry of Oil and Gas, did not provide details regarding Total’s decision.

The company signed an exploration andproduction-sharing agreement in December 2013 for Block 41, which lies off theOmani coast northwest of Muscat and covers almost 24,000 square kilometres ofseabed with depths of up to 3,000 metres.

Aufi also said that last year Hungarian oilgroup MOL had pulled out from Block 34, and Norwegian oil firm DNO from Block31.