ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - Turkish Consul General in Erbil Erman Topcu on Wednesday visited the Kurdistan Region Deputy Prime Minister Qubad Talabani to discuss a range of topics including the export of Kurdish oil following a recent deal between Erbil and Baghdad to hand over the oil to Iraq’s state-owned company.
“We had a sincere conversation about the government formation negotiations in the KRG [Kurdistan Regional Government], the passage of the Budget Law amendment in the Iraqi parliament, oil exports, and regional and global developments,” the consulate cited the diplomat as saying on X.
Kurdistan Region held its long overdue parliamentary elections in October but the political parties have yet to reach a final agreement on government formation.
The polls resulted in consolidation of power for the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) which won 39 spots in the 100-seat legislature, followed by the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) with 23.
Both parties said on Tuesday that they had reached an initial deal.
Talabani is a senior member of the PUK.
The Iraqi government proposed an amendment to the three-year federal budget law’s Article 12 in November. The lawmakers passed the bill on Sunday after months of discussions.
The Iraqi oil minister told state media on Monday that they had “initiated coordination with the Kurdistan Regional Government by formally requesting the proper handover of oil to SOMO,” referring to the state-owned State Organization for Marketing of Oil.
The Kurdish government expressed its readiness to hand over the oil to SOMO.
Oil exports from the Kurdistan Region through the Iraq-Turkey pipeline have been suspended since March 2023 after a Paris-based arbitration court ruled in favor of Baghdad against Ankara, saying the latter had violated a 1973 pipeline agreement by allowing Erbil to begin independent oil exports in 2014.
Before the halt, Erbil exported around 400,000 barrels per day through the pipeline, in addition to some 75,000 barrels of Kirkuk’s oil.
