Management over profitable exports was a serious level of competition between Baghdad and Kurdistan area, with a key pipeline to Turkiye shut since 2023.
Printed On 27 Sep 2025
Iraq has resumed crude oil exports from the semi-autonomous Kurdistan area to Turkiye after an interim deal broke a two-and-a-half-year impasse over authorized and technical disputes.
The resumption began at 6am native time (03:00 GMT), in line with an announcement from Iraq’s oil ministry on Saturday. “Operations began at a fast tempo and with full smoothness with out recording any important technical issues,” the ministry stated.
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Turkish Vitality Minister Alparslan Bayraktar additionally confirmed the event in a put up on X.
The settlement between Iraq’s federal authorities, the Kurdistan regional authorities (KRG) and overseas oil producers working within the area will enable 180,000 to 190,000 barrels per day (bpd) of crude to movement to Turkiye’s Ceyhan port, Iraq’s oil minister instructed Kurdish broadcaster Rudaw on Friday.
The resumption follows a tripartite settlement reached earlier this week between the ministry, the Kurdish area’s pure assets ministry, and worldwide oil corporations working within the area.
America had pushed for a restart, which is anticipated to finally deliver as much as 230,000 bpd of crude again to worldwide markets at a time when the Group of the Petroleum Exporting Nations (OPEC) is boosting output to achieve market share. US Secretary of State Marco Rubio welcomed the deal in an announcement, saying it “will deliver tangible advantages for each People and Iraqis”.
Iraq’s OPEC delegate, Mohammed al-Najjar, stated his nation can export greater than it’s now after the resumption of flows through the Kirkuk-Ceyhan pipeline, along with different deliberate initiatives at Basra port, state information company INA reported on Saturday.
“OPEC member states have the correct to demand a rise of their [production] shares particularly if they’ve initiatives that led to a rise in manufacturing capability,” he stated.
Firms working within the Kurdistan area will obtain $16 per barrel to cowl manufacturing and transportation prices. The eight oil corporations that signed the deal and the Kurdish authorities have agreed to fulfill inside 30 days of exports resuming to work on a mechanism for settling the excellent debt of $1bn the Kurdistan area owes to the corporations.
Management over profitable oil exports has been a serious level of competition between Baghdad and Erbil, with the deal seen as a step in direction of boosting Iraq’s oil revenues and stabilising the connection between the central authorities in Baghdad and the Kurdish area.
Oil exports had been beforehand independently bought by the Kurdish authorities, with out the approval or oversight of the federal authorities in Baghdad, by the port of Ceyhan in Turkiye.
The Kirkuk-Ceyhan pipeline was halted in March 2023 when the Worldwide Chamber of Commerce in Paris ordered Turkiye to pay Iraq $1.5bn in damages for unauthorised exports by the Kurdish regional authorities.
The Affiliation of the Petroleum Business of Kurdistan, which represents worldwide oil corporations working within the area, put losses to Iraq because the pipeline closed at greater than $35bn.
