An Iraqi oil official told Archyde.com that Iraq had stopped exports of 450,000 barrels per day of crude oil from the autonomous Kurdistan region and the Kirkuk fields in the north of the country today, Saturday, following winning a lengthy arbitration case once morest Turkey.
In a case dating back to 2014, Baghdad said Turkey had violated a joint agreement by allowing the KRG to export oil through a pipeline to the Turkish port of Ceyhan. Baghdad considers KRG exports illegal.
“The International Commercial Arbitration Court formally notified Iraq of its final decision on Thursday, and the decision was in favor of Iraq,” said a senior Iraqi oil official.
A source stated that Turkey had informed Iraq that it would respect the ruling in the arbitration case.
Turkish shipping officials told Iraqi employees at Turkey’s Ceyhan oil export center that no ship would be allowed to load cargoes of Kurdish crude without the approval of the Iraqi government, according to a document seen by Archyde.com.
A separate document, also seen by Archyde.com, showed that Turkey then stopped pumping Iraqi crude through the pipeline to Ceyhan.
One of the officials told Archyde.com that Iraq stopped today, Saturday, pumping oil from its part of the pipeline that extends from the Kirkuk oil fields in the north of the country.
Iraq was pumping 370,000 barrels per day of KRG oil and 75,000 barrels per day of federal government oil through the pipeline before it was stopped, according to a source familiar with the pipeline’s operations.
Another official in the Ministry of Oil said, “A delegation from the Ministry of Oil will go to Turkey soon to meet with Turkish energy officials to agree on new mechanisms for exporting Iraqi crude oil in a manner consistent with the arbitration decision.”
