Kurds threaten action against Iraqi oil buyers

The Iraqi Kurdish regional authoritiy warns oil companies against buying Iraqi oil, calling the move complicit as the Baghdad government has not been paying its share of revenue from sales Iraqi Kurdistan has threatened to take legal action against buyers of the country’s oil unless the autonomous region is paid its share of revenue from any sales.

The Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) said July 9 buyers of Iraqi oil were complicit in violating the constitution because the Baghdad central government has cut the region’s 17 percent entitlement of the national budget.

It is unclear whether the threat will influence major buyers of Iraqi crude, but it nevertheless illustrates the KRG’s increasingly assertive stance in a long-running dispute with Baghdad over control of its natural resources.

Baghdad has slashed the KRG’s budget since January as punishment for the region’s moves to export and sell oil directly on international markets, also threatening legal action against buyers of Kurdish crude.

“The KRG has the right, in circumstances where the Iraqi federal government is not sharing revenues in accordance with the Iraqi constitution, to take such action as the KRG considers appropriate to obtain all entitlements the Iraqi federal government is required to pay to the KRG under the Iraqi constitution,” said a statement from the region’s Ministry of Natural Resources in Arbil.

“Buyers who fail to make such payments to the KRG will be facilitating the Iraqi federal government’s breach of the KRG’s rights and passing to the Iraqi federal government monies that rightfully belong to the KRG.”

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