Iraq oil exports through Hormuz remain at 10% of pre-war levels: minister

ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - Iraq’s oil minister said Friday the country’s oil exports through the strategic Strait of Hormuz have dropped to less than 10 percent of pre-war levels as ongoing restrictions and security concerns continue to disrupt shipments.

Regarding current export levels through the Strait of Hormuz, Oil Minister Basim Mohammed Khudair told Rudaw that “it does not reach 10 percent of the amount that was previously exported through the strait.”

The strategic Strait of Hormuz, through which around one-fifth of global oil supplies pass, has faced repeated restrictions and disruptions amid tensions between the United States and Iran since the outbreak of the six-week war that began on February 28. The fighting was temporarily halted on April 8 through a Pakistan-brokered ceasefire.

Before the war, Iraq produced around 4.5 million barrels of oil per day and exported roughly 3.5 million barrels daily, with nearly 90 percent of exports passing through the waterway.

Khudair said Iraq still has contracts to export 200 million barrels of oil through the chokehold, but shipping companies remain reluctant to operate there.

“But companies are hesitant and cannot ensure their ships and crews can pass through the waterway,” the minister said.

Since restrictions intensified in the Strait of Hormuz, Baghdad has sought alternative export routes for its crude oil.

According to Khudair, Iraq’s only continuous export route currently runs through the Kurdistan Region pipeline, with exports standing at approximately 200,000 barrels per day.

In mid-March, as the Iran war continued, Erbil and Baghdad reached an agreement to resume exports of Kirkuk oil through the Kurdistan Region’s pipeline to Turkey after a temporary halt earlier in the month. International operators had suspended production as a precaution following the outbreak of the war.

Khudair said Iraqi Prime Minister Ali al-Zaidi has instructed the oil ministry to diversify export routes and increase export capacity.

Turkey is set to terminate a 1973 oil export agreement with Baghdad in July. The agreement, first signed on August 27, 1973, has been renewed several times, most recently in 2010.

Regarding the future of the deal, Khudair said, “Yesterday I met with the Turkish Ambassador, and we both are ready to renew the pipeline contract.”


Malik Mohammed contributed to this article.