Baghdad, Erbil to renew oil exports agreement: SOMO

ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - A landmark three-month agreement between Baghdad and Erbil that enabled the resumption of oil exports from the Kurdistan Region to international markets in late September, after nearly three years of suspension, is set to be renewed, an official from Iraq’s state oil marketer confirmed to Rudaw.

Oil exports from the Kurdistan Region resumed on September 27 following a tripartite agreement involving the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG), the federal government in Baghdad, and international oil companies operating in the Region. Exports had been halted since March 2023 after Iraq won an arbitration case against Turkey in a Paris-based court.

The current agreement is due to expire in late December.

“The agreement will be renewed without any problem,” said Hamdi Shingali, deputy head of Iraq’s State Oil Marketing Organization (SOMO). “Oil exports from the Kurdistan Region will continue.”

According to Shingali, approximately 200,000 barrels of oil from Kurdistan Region oilfields are currently exported each day.

Under the agreement’s terms, the KRG’s Ministry of Natural Resources has committed to supplying a minimum of 230,000 barrels per day (bpd) to SOMO for export. An additional 50,000 bpd is allocated for domestic consumption within the Kurdistan Region, Kamal Mohammed, natural resources minister told Rudaw in mid-November.

Mohammed said that, as of November, more than 10 million barrels of Kurdistan Region oil had been exported to international markets through the federal government.

He also noted that the Turkey-Iraq Pipeline has a total export capacity of 750,000 bpd, adding that prior to the 2023 halt, the Kurdistan Region exported between 400,000 and 420,000 bpd.