Iraq’s NOC resumes flows via KRG pipe

BAGHDAD, August 19, 2016 – The Iraqi Ministry of Oil’s North Oil Company (NOC) has resumed transporting oil from its northern fields via a pipeline controlled by the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG), a ministry spokesperson said on Thursday.

The flows, reported at 70,000 bopd, were halted in March, when the ministry ordered NOC to stop transporting crude in an apparent bid to force the Kurdish authorities into an agreement with Baghdad. “We have two options,” then-Oil Minister Adil Abd Al Mahdi wrote on his Facebook page at the time, saying that the two parties would either have to revisit the December 2014 agreement between Baghdad and the KRG or draft a new agreement on revenue-sharing if the flow of oil from NOC is to resume.

The resumption of flows via the KRG-controlled pipeline followed encouraging statements by newly installed Minister of Oil Jabar Ali Al Luaibi, who took office earlier this week. The former South Oil Company executive said there were “solutions to the existing problems between the federal government and the Kurdistan Regional Government about the oil file.” The KRG, via a spokesperson on Thursday, said it was “ready to negotiate on everything.”

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