ERBIL, Kurdistan Region — The Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) on Friday harshly condemned the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) attack on the Kirkuk-Ceyhan pipeline, which transports crude from the Kurdistan Region to Turkey.
In a statement, the KRG cabinet condemned the PKK's recent attack on the Kurdistan oil pipeline in Sirnak in the southeast of Turkey. It described the attack an attempt to discredit Kurdish people in the Kurdistan region.
“Baghdad budget impasse and ongoing fight against Islamic State (ISIS) have impoverished Kurdish people and KRG in Kurdistan. This oil pipeline is the only source of the livelihood of people in Kurdistan region and more than 1.8 million refugee and IDPs in the region,” the statement read.
The KRG statement identified the Ceyhan pipeline as the major source to a resource-constrained region of Kurdistan and described the pipeline crucial source for Peshmerga that is battling the terror group of ISIS.
A similar attack targeted the Turkey-Iran natural gas pipeline on Tuesday in Agri, a Kurdish province of Turkey on the border with Iran.
On Wednesday, the official website of the armed wing of the PKK in Turkey, the People’s Protection Forces (HPG), claimed its forces had carried out a sabotage operation against the pipeline in the area between Silopi and the Cizre district, both in Sirnak, where the Kirkuk-Ceyhan pipeline passes.
