Iraq, Kurdistan region agree to resume northern oil flow
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Iraq sends a formal request to Ankara to restart the oil exports.
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An oil refinery in Iraq (AFP)
Baghdad and Erbil finalized an agreement on Tuesday to restore oil flow into the Iraq-Turkey pipeline, Reuters reported, citing officials.
Prime Minister of Iraq's Kurdistan Region Masrour Barzani went to Baghdad earlier today to formalize the deal with Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani.
Iraq sent an official request to Turkey to restart oil exports through the pipeline and "in the next few hours pumping will resume," a Baghdad official told the news site.
Last week, exports of nearly 450,000 barrels per day to Turkey were stopped due to a ruling by a Paris Court of Arbitration that Ankara violated a bilateral treaty with Baghdad by allowing Iraqi Kurdistan to launch independent oil exports in 2014.
Read more: Iraq's oil export revenues hit 50-year high
Following the flow halt, oil companies in Iraq's Kurdistan Region either stopped production or decreased it and transferred the extracted oil into storage units, which impacted the oil market slightly.
But so far, the pipelines did not go into operation, Reuters added, citing a source who spoke on condition of anonymity.
Oil from the Iraqi Kurdistan Region will be sold and exported through Iraqi state-owned firm SOMO, and the revenue will be deposited in Baghdad's central bank but will be under Iraqi Kurdistan control, while the Iraqi government will have access to the account and auditing authority, two Iraqi officials told the new site.
Barzani is also set to hold talks with al-Sudani over a separate oil and gas dispute that has dragged on for nearly two decades.
"Everyone must abide by this agreement and implement it," al-Sudani said in a joint press conference with Barzani, adding that the agreement was temporary until the budget bill is approved by the parliament.
The bill "will cover all obligations and solve all problems," the Iraqi PM concluded.
Read more: Job of US Marine corps was killing people: Iraq War veterans speak up
US saves its oil pit
Last week, former US National Security Advisor John Bolton expressed the US' interest in establishing an independent Iraqi Kurdistan - not under Iraqi governance.
"I think an independent Kurdistan is in the interest of the United States. It’s hard to define exactly what its boundaries would be. But I think the state of Iraq has failed. I think certainly Kurdish territories in Iraq could be the basis of a new independent country," he told Rudaw.
On Monday, the United States called on Iraq and Turkey to restart the flow of oil from Iraqi Kurdistan's region to Turkey, challenging the court order.
The Bush administration started supporting the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) led by Masoud Barzani, the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK), and the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI) immediately upon invading Iraq.
Read more: 20 years of war: How much did the US war in Iraq, Syria cost?
The Kurdish parties inserted Article 140 into the new Iraqi constitution in 2005 to annex Kirkuk - home to massive oil reserves and so-called disputed territories, including Sinjar. The effort failed two years later, but when ISIS invaded Mosul, the Kurds got a second chance at trying.
As soon as the Iraqi army withdrew, the Kurdish Peshmerga forces tried to take Kirkuk, which increased their oil reserves from 4 billion to 13 billion barrels and helped them obtain the intrinsic base needed for Kurdistan to become an "independent state".
The oil in Kirkuk immediately started being sold to Turkey to then be transferred to Israeli buyers to export to "Israel". By the time 2015 rolled around, Kurdish oil accounted for 77% of "Israel’s" oil imports.
Here's where the US actively comes in. A referendum for the independence of Kurdistan was announced in 2017 by Barzani, which Bolton showed strong support for and which Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu directly supported in turn.
