Exports offer hope in Iraq oil share row

The Kurdistan regional government has told oil companies working in the northern Iraqi province that they will be able to export oil using Iraq’s main pipeline as early as next month, an apparent breakthrough in a long-running dispute about sharing Iraq’s oil wealth.

The oil ministry in Baghdad confirmed that crude extracted from some fields in Kurdistan could be exported. There remained significant confusion, however, and analysts warned this could be yet another false start. “We are absolutely certain oil will flow on [June 1],” Ashti Hawrami, the KRG’s oil minister, told the Financial Times.

“Iraq desperately needs the oil revenues, and no one can deny that. The rest that needs to be worked out is just rough edges – I am talking about the oil law, the constitution, the legalities.”