Crude oil swap between Iraq, Iran has begun: Iranian Oil Ministry

A long-anticipated exchange of crude oil between Iraq and Iran has begun.

ERBIL (Kurdistan 24) – A long-anticipated exchange of crude oil between Iraq and Iran has begun, the Iranian oil ministry’s news agency SHANA revealed on Sunday.

The deal was signed between Tehran and Baghdad last December and is meant to swap up to 60,000 barrels of oil per day (bdp) from Kirkuk in exchange for Iranian oil for one year and is subject to renewal.

Tanker trucks will deliver crude oil from the disputed territory which fell to Iraqi forces and pro-Iran Shia militias in October last year following a military takeover of the region.

The agreement, signed by Baghdad unilaterally, without discussions with the Kirkuk Provincial Council or Parliament, raised concerns among locals who criticized the federal government for failing to build a single refinery in the province.

Kirkuk is one of the largest oilfields in the Middle East, estimated to contain around nine billion barrels of recoverable oil.

The project had repeatedly been delayed, but the swap is now expected to begin.

In April, the Iranian Ministry of Petroleum said Baghdad’s unpreparedness and technical issues in Iraq were behind the delay of the oil swap.

According to state-run Tasnim News, Iran’s Petroleum Ministry said the fault for the four-month delay “lies in Iraq’s failure to remove obstacles.”

“The slight delay in implementing the major deal on swapping the crude oil produced in northern Iraq is mainly because of unprepared infrastructures and some logistical deficiencies on Iraq's part,” it was quoted as saying.