ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - Iraq’s parliament on Tuesday finished the first reading of an amendment to the country’s budget law in a bid to resume Kurdistan Region’s oil exports which have been halted for nearly 20 months.
The parliament convened to discuss a range of issues, including a bill recently submitted by the federal government to increase the rate for the production and transportation of a barrel of oil from the Kurdistan Region by nearly $10. The aim of the move is to pave the way for a deal between Baghdad, Erbil and international oil companies operating in the Region to restart the exports of the Kurdish oil via Turkey.
The parliament said in a statement that it finished the first reading of the bill. Following the second reading, it will be put to a vote.
Earlier this month, the Iraqi government approved a proposal to amend articles from the federal budget to authorize compensation to companies operating in the Kurdistan Region for oil production and transportation costs, setting the rate at $16 per barrel.
Iraq’s three-year federal budget bill, passed in June 2023, had set the rate for one barrel of oil at $6.90 and international oil companies (IOCs) have requested three times that amount.
Oil exports from the Kurdistan Region through the Iraq-Turkey pipeline have been suspended since March 2023 after a ruling by a Paris-based arbitration court ruled in favor of Baghdad over Ankara, saying the latter had breached a 1973 pipeline agreement by allowing Erbil to export oil independently since 2014.
Before the halt, Erbil exported around 400,000 barrels per day through the pipeline, in addition to some 75,000 barrels of Kirkuk’s oil.
Kurdistan Region Prime Minister Masrour Barzani said on Saturday that the halt has cost them $20 billion.
Fuad Hussein, Iraq's foreign minister, told Rudaw on November 14 that the exportation of the Kurdish oil could resume in weeks.