“What we are seeing globally, with both Russia and Saudi Arabia cutting back oil production, the cost of fuel is going up and that has a negative impact globally. And so it is important that the Kurdish people are allowed to export their products, whatever that may be but especially oil at this time of crisis,” Congressman Andy Ogles, who represents Tennessee’s Fifth Congressional District in the United States House of Representatives, told Rudaw’s Diyar Kurda.
Turkey stopped the flow of Kurdish oil through the Iraq-Turkey pipeline after a Paris arbitration court ruling on March 23 ruled in favor of Baghdad against Ankara, saying the latter had breached a 1973 pipeline agreement when it allowed the Kurdistan Region to begin independent oil exports in 2014.
Several meetings have been held between Iraqi and Turkish delegations since March, aimed at continuing the exports, but they have not yielded any results.
Safeen Dizayee, head of the Region’s Department of Foreign Relations, said on August 29 that the Kurdish government had lost around five billion dollars due to the halt.
The Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) has failed to pay the salaries of its civil servants on time and in full for years due to the financial crisis it has faced since 2014 when the Islamic State (ISIS) war began.
The suspension of its oil exports has further escalated the issue. Civil servants have yet to receive their July salaries. A war of words has begun between Erbil and Baghdad in recent days after the federal government decided not to send the KRG’s share in the federal budget despite passing a contentious budget law earlier this year.
The congressman said that Iran may have a role in this issue.
“I have concerns, quite frankly, about the input and the amount of control Iran may be having over this conversation, over the budgetary issues,” he said.
