‘The ball is in Turkey’s court’, says Iraqi oil official on resumption of Kurdish oil export

ERBIL (Kurdistan 24) – Regarding the resumption of the Kurdistan Region’s oil export, the Iraqi Ministry of Oil told Kurdistan 24 on Sunday that the “ball is in Turkey’s court.”

The export has been halted since March 25 at the request of Baghdad after Iraq claimed victory against Ankara at the International Court of Arbitration in Paris for allowing Erbil to independently export its oil via the Turkish Ceyhan port. 

The resumption is not in the hands of Iraq and Kurdistan Region; “The ball is in Turkey’s court”, ‘Asim Jihad, the spokesperson for the Iraqi Ministry of Oil, told Kurdistan 24 on Sunday on the sidelines of the International exhibition and conference for oil projects and licensing in Baghdad.

The export outage has “negatively affected” every side, Jihad said, hoping the process to be resumed soon as it would solve the remaining issues.

The chief diplomat of the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) has previously estimated the loss of the stoppage to be $5 billion since late March.

Iraq and Turkey have held numerous discussions since March 25 to resume the export. However, the outage is still ongoing, as both sides are struggling to reach an agreement on the remaining lawsuits filed by Baghdad against Turkey for allowing independent Kurdish exports.

The court has awarded Baghdad $1.5 billion in compensation for the damages the country has endured as a result of the export. 

Ankara expects Baghdad to drop the remaining case against the country with regard to oil export.

Prior to the stoppage, the Kurdistan Region was exporting over 400,000 barrels of oil per day through a pipeline to Turkey’s Ceyhan port.

About 90,000 barrels of oil are currently being transferred to Baghdad by the Kurdish region in order to be used for domestic purposes, per an agreement inked in April between Kurdistan Region Prime Minister Masrour Barzani and Iraqi premier Mohammed Shia' Al-Sudani.