KRG minister: falling oil prices and ISIS create ‘perfect storm’

LONDON — Iraqi Kurdistan's minister of natural resources says falling oil prices and the threat of the Islamic State have created the "perfect storm" for the region's oil sector.
 
Speaking at the Iraq Petroleum Conference in London, Ashti Hawrami said despite these issues, the region's oil industry continues to grow and maintain stability.

"These have created for the Kurdistan region what some might call a 'perfect storm,' a geopolitical storm and yet the region has proven still resilient to all of these events,” Hawrami told Rudaw Tuesday. “Despite all of these events we still perform to maintain stability of the region."

The Kurdistan Regional Government has claimed the region exported a record of nearly 18 million barrels of oil in May, and Iraq's oil marketing company SOMO says the issue of ISIS capturing oil facilities is being tackled.
 
"Iraq is not like Syria. In Syria there is a huge vast area controlled by Daesh. But Daesh are in the middle now, so if we can control Ramadi then Daesh will be very weakened,” said SOMO Director General Falah Jassim Alamri at the conference. Daesh is the Arabic acronym for ISIS.  

But concerns remain over agreed oil export payments from Baghdad to the KRG, which the regional government claims are consistently short of what is expected. Baghdad on the other hand accuses Kurdistan of missing agreed quotas.