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THE Kurdistan Regional Government remains on collision course with the Iraqi federal government after its judicial council rejected demands to hand over control of oil supplies to Baghdad.
In a statement on Saturday, it said that the region’s oil law would remain in force and would not change despite a February ruling from Iraq’s federal court.
“The actions of the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) in relation to oil and gas operations are in accordance with the Iraqi constitution of 2005.
“The provisions of the oil and gas law issued by the parliament of the Kurdistan region in 2007 do not violate those of the Iraqi constitution,” the statement said.
The KRG has been developing oil and gas resources independently from Baghdad and introduced its own legislation in 2007 granting itself autonomy over how it would be administered.
The Iraqi government argues that the move is unconstitutional and said that under Article 112 it is entitled to audit all agreements between the KRG and global oil and gas companies.
But the KRG says this only applies to oil production prior to August 2005.
Under current arrangements the Kurdish region delivers 250,000 of more than 400,000 barrels of daily output to Baghdad in return for its share of the federal budget.
But “regional mafias” are accused of selling oil to Israel on the cheap with the Al-Araby Al-Jadeed newspaper saying prices are as low as $16 per barrel.
According to the Financial Times, Israel obtains as much as 75 per cent of its oil from the KRG, which has been accused of “collusion” with the Mossad spy agency.
The Israeli spooks are reported to have bases in the regional capital Erbil which have been attacked by Iraqi resistance groups in recent months.
A recent law passed by the Iraqi federal government criminalises the normalisation of relations with Israel, punishable by death.
Kurdistan’s regional prime minister Mesrour Barzani has also come under fire for a secretive 50-year oil deal with Turkey.
He recently visited Britain where he discussed increasing oil supply to Europe to reduce dependency on Russian supplies.
Kurdistan Workers Party leader Cemil Bayik says this is the source of the Turkish invasion and de facto occupation of the region as the pipeline runs through territory controlled by the Kurdish resistance group.
