WHITE PLAINS, NY, Dec. 5 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- Chaparral Resources, Inc. (OTCBB: CHAR) (the Company) today announced that upon the approval of the merger of the Company's majority shareholder, Nelson Resources Limited ("Nelson"), with and into Caspian Investments Resources Ltd. ("Caspian"), a wholly-owned subsidiary of LUKOIL Overseas Holding Ltd. ("Lukoil") three of the five directors of Chaparral, Mr. R. Frederick Hodder, Mr. Nicholas P. Greene and Mr. Simon Gill, who had been employees of Nelson, resigned from the Board of Directors of Chaparral. Mr. Hodder also resigned as Chairman of the Board. Messrs. Hodder, Greene and Gill have been replaced on the Board by Mr. Dmitri Timoshenko, Mr. Oktay Movsumov, and Mr. Boris Zilbermints, who are employees of the LUKOIL group. The other two members of the Company's Board of Directors, Alan D. Berlin and Peter G. Dilling, will continue to serve as independent directors. The officers of the Company are continuing in their current capacities. The key members of management of the Company's subsidiaries have been replaced by employees of the LUKOIL group. Chaparral Resources, Inc. is an oil and gas development and production company. The Company's only operating asset is its participation in the development of the Karakuduk Field, in the Republic of Kazakhstan, through KKM, which is the operating company. The Company has directly and indirectly a 60% ownership interest in KKM with the other 40% ownership interest being held by Caspian which holds a majority interest in Chaparral and operates several other producing oil fields in Kazakhstan. More information is available on the Company's web site, http://www.chaparralresources.com/. Information Regarding Forward-Looking Statements: Except for historical information contained herein, the statements in this News Release are forward-looking statements that are made pursuant to the safe harbor provisions of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Forward-looking statements involve known and unknown risks and uncertainties, which may cause the Company's actual results in future periods to differ materially from forecasted results. These risks and uncertainties include, among other things, volatility of oil prices, product demand, market competition, risks inherent in the Company's international operations, imprecision of reserve estimates and Chaparral's ability to replace and expand oil and gas reserves. These and other risks are described in the Company's Annual Report on Form 10-K and other filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The Company's reports and filings may be found on the SEC internet site http://www.sec.com/. DATASOURCE: Chaparral Resources, Inc. CONTACT: Olav Svela, 1-866-559-3822,

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