Iraq is working to restore an abandoned pipeline to transport oil from the city of Kirkuk directly to the Turkish port of Ceyhan, bypassing the route through Kurdistan Region. This was announced by Iraq’s oil minister Hayan Abdel-Ghani, according to Reuters.
Iraq plans to complete inspections of a 100-kilometer section of the pipeline “within a week” to enable direct exports from Kirkuk.
The restoration of the Kirkuk–Ceyhan oil pipeline, which operated for more than a decade, will provide an alternative export route to the existing pipeline through Kurdistan.
Exports through the 960-kilometer pipeline — which previously accounted for about 0.5% of global oil supplies — were halted in 2014 after repeated attacks by militants from Islamic State.
Earlier, Iraq’s Ministry of Oil asked the Kurdish regional government for permission to use the Kurdistan pipeline as an alternative route for oil transportation. However, the ministry later said the Kurdish government had imposed arbitrary conditions for the use of the pipeline.
Officials from the Kurdistan Region rejected accusations that they were refusing to allow oil exports through the pipeline and stated that Baghdad had failed to address security problems and economic challenges facing the region’s oil sector.
