Rachel North

Desire Petroleum plc

("Desire" or "the Company")

Rachel North

Desire Petroleum plc (AIM:DES) the oil and gas company wholly focused on the North Falkland Basin, wishes to announce that both regulatory and partner approvals have been granted for Desire to drill the 14/15-2 Rachel North well.

The 14/15-1 well has been plugged and abandoned and the rig is currently waiting on weather to move to the Rachel North location.

The Rachel North well will be drilled vertically with an estimated total depth of 3,050 metres. The bottom hole location will be 1.7 kilometres from the Rachel sidetrack 14/15-1Z bottom hole location. Drilling operations are expected to last around 35 days.

It is intended that this well will evaluate the sands with oil shows encountered in the Rachel sidetrack as well as a number of possible additional sands not seen in the sidetrack.

Desire wishes to thank both the regulatory authorities and its partner Rockhopper Exploration plc for their speedy approvals to move to the new Rachel North location.

A further announcement will be made once the well has been spudded.

Enquiries:

This announcement has been reviewed by Dr Ian Duncan, Chief Executive Officer of Desire, for the purposes of the current Guidance Note for Mining, Oil and Gas Companies issued by the London Stock Exchange in June 2009. Dr Duncan is a Fellow of the Geological Society, Chartered Geologist, and a member of the American Association of Petroleum Geologists with over 35 years experience in petroleum exploration and management.