The Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) has failed to respond to an Iraqi government request to link a 300,000 b/d oil pipeline, which is near completion, to a metering station on the Iraqi side of the federally controlled Iraq-Turkey pipeline system. Irbil is insisting on tying the pipeline to the Turkish portion of Iraq’s main northern export pipeline, Dr Shahristani tells MEES. Should Ankara agree to independent exports of oil produced in its KRG territory, Baghdad would have to weigh its options to confront what he said would be a breach of an internationally binding transit agreement.
“They have asked to connect to the Iraq-Turkey pipeline and we have told them (KRG) that they have to link it before the border at the metering station,” Dr Shahristani said in Dubai on the sidelines of an energy conference. “They refused because they don’t want the Iraqi government to measure how much oil they are producing and how much they are selling…We have insisted that they should link up to the metering station. There is still no response.” (CONTINUED - 3026 WORDS)
