Iraq's semi autonomous region of Kurdistan plans to halt oil exports on August 31st 2012 if the central government does not make all outstanding payments which could mean the proposed increase in Iraq's overall shipments to world markets will be brief.
Kurdistan said that it would restart exports this week in a bid to end the payments dispute with Baghdad. The Kurdistan Regional Government says the central government has withheld payment of USD 1.5 billion.
Mr Ashti Hawrami natural resources minister of Iraq made the statement giving the end August deadline in a letter posted on the KRG's website and addressed to oil companies DNO, Genel Energy and Kar Group.
He said that “What I have in mind is to restart the oil export for only one month ie for all of the August period. If the payments are not released by the end of this period, then we agree to halt all the export at the midnight of August 31st 2012.”
The Kurdistan Regional Government and Baghdad are locked in a long-running feud over oil and land rights that have shut in exports for the past four months from the oilfields being tapped by foreign oil companies in the northern region. Letters released on the KRG website show the companies were initially reluctant to go along with the export restart.
Mr Tony Hayward CEO of Genel said in a letter to Hawrami the company had not been paid for the majority of oil exported in 2009 and 2011. This has had a very significant impact on our operations.
The KRG said that exports would remain at 100,000 barrels per day for a month and if payments were forthcoming, could move swiftly up to 200,000 barrels per day.
Under Iraq's budget, the KRG is to supply 175,000 barrels per day of crude for export but the KRG halted the trade in early April saying Baghdad owed it a backlog of payments. The central government is required to route 50 per cent of the KRG's export earnings to Kurdistan to cover producing companies' previous costs.
Baghdad issued 2 payments in 2011, totaling USD 514 million the KRG said it is owed USD 1.5 billion. Crude produced in Kurdistan is fed into Iraq's Kirkuk export stream and sold onto world markets via the Turkish Mediterranean port of Ceyhan. The KRG export halt had cut Kirkuk shipments by a quarter to below 300,000 barrels per day.
Source - Reuters
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