ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - Iraq and the Kurdistan Region have so far lost around five billion dollars due to the halt in the Region’s oil exports through Turkey's Ceyhan port since March, a Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) official told reporters on Tuesday, adding that Baghdad has not taken any “practical steps” to resume the exports.
Turkey stopped the flow of Kurdish oil through the Iraq-Turkey pipeline after a Paris arbitration court ruling on March 23 ruled in favor of Baghdad against Ankara, saying the latter had breached a 1973 pipeline agreement when it allowed the Kurdistan Region to begin independent oil exports in 2014.
Several meetings have been held between Iraqi and Turkish delegations since March, aimed at continuing the exports, but they have not yielded any results.
“Turkey supports the resumption of exporting the Kurdistan Region’s oil, the Kurdistan Region is definitely very eager, and Baghdad, officially, say they are ready but they have not really taken any practical steps yet,” Safeen Dizayee, head of the KRG’s Department of Foreign Relations, told reporters on Tuesday.
Dizayee said that efforts are ongoing to reach a common ground and an understanding with Baghdad to restart the exports, adding that the resumption was needed for Erbil to fulfill its obligations within the federal budget law of handing over at least 400,000 barrels of crude oil per day to Iraq’s State Oil Marketing Organization (SOMO).
The arbitration court ordered Turkey to pay a penalty of $1.5 billion in damages to Baghdad for allowing the KRG to independently export its oil between 2014 and 2018.
Dizayee said it was “mathematically illogical” for Baghdad to cost itself and Erbil five billion dollars in protest to not receiving $1.5 billion from Ankara.
Erbil and Baghdad signed an agreement to resume the Region’s exports in April, but there is still no oil flowing through the pipeline to Turkey over four months later, as Ankara claims to be inspecting the port tubes that might have been damaged following February’s earthquake.
