Baghdad and Erbil agree to resume Kurdish oil exports: Government
Lucrative oil exports have been a major point of tension between Baghdad and Erbil, with a key pipeline through Turkey shut since 2023 over legal disputes and technical issues.
The Kurdistan regional government shall 'immediately begin delivering all oil produced' in the region's field to Baghdad's State Oil Marketing Organization (SOMO) 'for export,' the Iraqi government said in a statement.
The quantity should be no less than 230,000 barrels per day, and Baghdad will pay an advance of $16 a barrel.
The Kurdistan regional government said in a statement it 'welcomes' the deal, and hoped all agreements would be respected.
Oil exports were previously independently sold by the Kurdistan region, without the approval or oversight of the central administration in Baghdad, through the port of Ceyhan in Turkey.
But the region's official oil exports have been frozen since March 2023 when the arbitration tribunal of the International Chamber of Commerce in Paris ruled oil exports by the regional government illegal and said that Baghdad had the exclusive right to market all Iraqi oil.
The decision halted the region's independent exports by pipeline via Turkey.
Ever since, the federal and regional governments have been haggling over the production and transport costs payable to the region and its commercial partners among other financial issues.
The latest agreement should also solve the long-standing issue of unpaid salaries for civil servants in Kurdistan, which has been tied to the tension over oil.
The federal finance ministry will pay salaries for May once SOMO confirms it has received the oil at the Ceyhan port.
The regional government said it hoped that the issue of salaries would be treated separately from any disputes.
The deal comes after a tense few weeks in Kurdistan, which has seen a spate of unclaimed drone attacks mostly against oil fields, with the latest strike hitting a site operated by a Norwegian firm on Thursday morning -- the second attack in two days on the same site.
There has been no claim of responsibility for any of the past week's attacks, and Baghdad has promised an investigation to identify the culprits.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Arab News
4 hours ago
- Arab News
Iraq makes ‘decisive findings' over Israel-Iran war drone attacks
BAGHDAD: Drones used to attack military bases in Iraq during the recent Israel-Iran war were manufactured outside Iraq but were launched inside its territory, according to the 'decisive findings' of an investigation published on Friday. The report of an investigative committee formed under the directive of Prime Minister Mohammed Shia Al-Sudani did not identify who was behind the attacks that targeted radar and air defense systems last month. The attacks on several military bases, including some housing US troops, damaged radar systems at Camp Taji, north of Baghdad, and at Imam Ali Base in Dhi Qar province. Iraqi army spokesperson Sabah Al-Naaman said the investigation had reached 'decisive findings.' He said the drones used were manufactured outside Iraq but were launched from locations inside Iraqi territory. All drones used in the attacks were of the same type, indicating that a single actor was behind the entire campaign, he said. Al-Naaman said the investigation had identified the entities responsible for coordinating and executing the operations, but he did not name them. 'Legal measures will be taken against all those involved, and they will be referred to the Iraqi judiciary to be held accountable in accordance with the law,' the statement said. Before the drone attacks, Iran-backed Iraqi militias had previously threatened to target American bases if the US attacked Iran. Some of the militias are part of the Popular Mobilization Forces, a coalition of armed groups that is officially under the command of the Iraqi military, although in practice they largely act independently. More recently, several oil fields in the semi-autonomous northern Kurdish region have come under attack by drones, further exacerbating tensions between the central government and Kurdish authorities and raising concerns over the security of Iraq's critical infrastructure.
Al Arabiya
7 hours ago
- Al Arabiya
US firms to develop Syria energy masterplan after Trump lifts sanctions
US-based firms Baker Hughes, Hunt Energy and Argent LNG will develop a masterplan for Syria's oil, gas and power sector, Argent LNG CEO Jonathan Bass said on Friday, in a partnership aimed at rebuilding energy infrastructure shattered by 14 years of civil war. The move marks a swift turnaround as US companies enter a country previously under one of the world's tightest sanctions regimes that US President Donald Trump lifted at the end of June. The companies plan to help explore and extract oil and gas and produce power to help get the economy running as the government seeks to put Syria back on the map. The plan comes after a dash by other companies, many from Gulf states, to sign deals to bolster Syria's power generation and ports infrastructure. Details of the plan have not been previously reported. 'We are initiating the development of a comprehensive masterplan for energy and power generation in Syria, based on a preliminary assessment of opportunities for near-term improvements in generation capacity and service delivery,' Bass told Reuters via phone. 'Our efforts aim to support the revitalization of the energy sector in coordination with relevant stakeholders,' he added. 'This includes potential activities across the value chain—from exploration and production to electricity generation, including combined-cycle power plants,' he said, declining to elaborate further. Argent LNG, which is developing a liquefied natural gas export facility in Louisiana, in January signed a non-binding agreement to supply Bangladesh up to 5 million metric tons of the fuel annually, the first major US LNG supply deal since Trump began his second term. Reuters received no immediate response to emailed questions to global energy services provider Baker Hughes and Texas-based electric utility Hunt Energy. The plan is to begin with areas west of the Euphrates River, under control of the Syrian government. Syria's east, where much of its oil is produced, remains controlled by the Syrian Democratic Forces, a US-backed and Kurdish-led armed group that Washington has urged to integrate with the new authorities in Damascus following the ouster of former Syrian strongman Bashar al-Assad. After 14 years of war, Syria's electricity sector is severely damaged, generating only 1.6 gigawatts of electricity, down from 9.5 GW before 2011. Billions of dollars of investment are needed to fix the sector, so the cash-strapped state is looking at private investment or donors to foot the bill. In May, Syria signed a memorandum of understanding with Qatar's UCC Holding to develop $7 billion worth of power generation projects, including four combined-cycle gas turbine power plants and a 1,000-MW solar power plant in southern Syria. Growing interest In a post on LinkedIn on Thursday, Syrian Finance Minister Yisr Barnieh said the three US-based companies were forming a coalition to invest in Syria and develop the country's energy sector. 'This visit signals a growing interest among American companies and investors in engaging with Syria,' he said. Bass, Hunt Energy CEO Hunter L. Hunt, and a senior executive at Baker Hughes arrived in Syria on a private jet on Wednesday morning and were meeting with Barnieh when Israel conducted a series of airstrikes on Damascus that shook the city, Bass said. 'It was big,' said Bass, who has been working on the energy project since visiting Damascus and meeting with Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa in April. He was part of both state-led and informal efforts to lobby Trump to meet with Sharaa. The landmark meeting took place in mid-May with a big push from the leaders of Turkey and Saudi Arabia, and Trump announced the end of Syria sanctions. As they are slowly phased out, investor interest in Syria has grown. A week of violence in the southern province of Sweida, however, has darkened the mood in the country and left at least 321 people dead, according to the Syrian Network for Human Rights, a human rights group. 'To work in Syria, there are potholes, there are ditches, it has craters,' said Bass. 'If you don't have the team that's willing to accept craters, don't come.'
Al Arabiya
10 hours ago
- Al Arabiya
Iraq's Kurdish oil exports restart is not imminent
A restart of Iraq's Kurdish oil exports is not imminent, sources close to the matter said on Friday, despite Iraq's federal government saying on Thursday that shipments would resume immediately. Baghdad and the Kurdistan Regional Government have been in negotiations since February to end a stand-off that has halted flows from the north of the country to Turkey's port of Ceyhan. The KRG was producing about 435,000 barrels per day (bpd) before the pipeline closure in March 2023. On Thursday the federal government said that Iraqi Kurdistan would resume oil exports immediately through the pipeline to Turkey despite drone attacks that have shut down half of the region's output. But on Friday a source at APIKUR, a group of oil companies working in Kurdistan, said that a restart depended on the receipt of written agreements. Another at KAR Group, which operates the pipeline, said that no preparations had been made for a restart. Baghdad and the companies have not yet agreed how to restart the exports, a KRG government source said, while a source at Turkey's Ceyhan said there was also no preparation at the terminal for a restart of flows. On Thursday, a statement from KRG Prime Minister Masrour Barzani said the government had approved a joint understanding with the federal government and it was awaiting financial details. Similar agreements in the past failed to secure a resumption in exports and it remains unclear if this deal will succeed. Oil companies working in Kurdistan have previously demanded that their production-sharing contracts should remain unchanged and their debts of nearly $1 billion be settled under any agreement. On Friday Genel Energy and Gulf Keystone Petroleum declined to comment, while DNO, Hunt Oil and HKN Energy did not immediately respond to requests for comment. Drone attacks Oilfields in Iraqi Kurdistan have been attacked by drones this week, with officials pointing to Iran-backed militias as the likely source of the attacks, although no group has claimed responsibility. They are the first such attacks on oilfields in the region and coincide with the first attacks in seven months on shipping in the Red Sea by Iran-aligned Houthi militants in Yemen. On Thursday a strike hit an oilfield operated by Norway's DNO in Tawke, the region's counter-terrorism service said. It was the week's second strike on a site operated by DNO, which operates the Tawke and Peshkabour oilfields in the Zakho area that borders Turkey. No casualties have been reported, but oil output in the region has been cut by between 140,000 bpd and 150,000 bpd, two energy officials said.
