ECONOMY
An Iraqi oil worker speaks on a radio at an oil refinery in the southern town of Nasiriyah, Iraq October 30, 2015. File photo: AFP
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ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - Iraqi oil minister confirmed on Wednesday that Baghdad has recently struck an agreement with Erbil to restart the Kurdistan Region's oil exports after nearly two years of suspension. The Kurdish government announced the deal earlier this week.
"We held a series of meetings with the Ministry of Natural Resources in the Kurdistan Region, which resulted in important understandings," Iraq's Oil Minister Hayyan Abdul Ghani told the state media on Wednesday.
"We have reached an agreement that guarantees joint cooperation for the operation of the Turkish port pipeline," he added.
The Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) on Sunday said it had struck a deal with the federal government to restart the Kurdish oil exports.
“An agreement was reached and confirmed to resume the export of the Region’s oil according to available quantities. Today, a joint technical team was formed to inspect the oil pipeline and determine its readiness,” the KRG’s team negotiating the matter with Baghdad said in a statement.
Iraqi oil minister said on Monday that the Iraq-Turkey pipeline, designated for the resumption of the Kurdistan Region’s oil exports through Turkey's Ceyhan port, was ready to use.
He expressed hope that “exports will resume within the next two days” after the resolution of “some technical issues.”
Oil exports from the Kurdistan Region through the Iraq-Turkey pipeline were suspended in March 2023 after a Paris-based arbitration court ruled in favor of Baghdad against Ankara, stating that the latter had violated a 1973 pipeline agreement by allowing Erbil to begin independent oil exports in 2014.
Before the suspension, Erbil was exporting approximately 400,000 barrels of oil per day through the Iraq-Turkey pipeline, in addition to 75,000 barrels per day from Kirkuk.
Iraq’s Prime Minister Mohammed Shia’ al-Sudani said on Wednesday that Baghdad wants to open a “new page” with the international oil companies operating in the Kurdistan Region. This came after the federal parliament approved an amendment to the budget law, increasing the fee of oil companies operating in the Kurdish region.
Sudani held a phone call with the US Secretary of State Marco Rubio on Tuesday, emphasizing the need to accelerate the resumption of oil exports from the Kurdistan Region.
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