|
Kurdistan govt negotiate with two Canadian
firms to construct two oil refineries
14.1.2008
|
|
|
|
January 14, 2008
Erbil-Hewler, Kurdistan Region 'Iraq', --
Iraq's self-governing northern Kurdistan region is
negotiating with two Canadian firms on a joint
venture to construct an oil refinery and continue
work on a second one to boost its fledgling oil
industry, its spokesman said on Sunday.
But Kurdish officials are facing opposition from the
central government in Baghdad, and on Sunday a group
of about 145 Sunni and Shiite lawmakers in
parliament expressed their deep concerns against
«any individual act» in Iraq's natural resources.
The Kurdish spokesman, Jamal Abdullah, said the
contracts are legal and that no one has the
authority to annul them. "We are going forward to
develop this sector to serve our people, and anyone
who has any complaint should file it to the federal
court," he said.
Iraq, the holder of the world's third-largest crude
oil reserves with an estimated 115 billion barrels,
aims to boost production to 3 million barrels per
day by the end of 2008. Parliament is currently
considering an oil law to divvy up the country's oil
and gas among Shiites, Sunnis and Kurds _ one of the
benchmarks sought by the United States to achieve
national reconciliation.
Abdullah said the two 20,000-barrel-per-day
refineries will be located in Sulaimaniyah, one of
three provinces that make up the Kurdistan regional
government and about 260 kilometers (160 miles)
northeast of Baghdad. The first refinery, in the
Bazian area, is scheduled to be completed by 2010 in
a joint venture with Canada's Heritage Oil.www.ekurd.net
The second refinery, to
be located at the Taq Taq oil field, would be
constructed by Genel and Canada's Addax Petroleum
and completed by early 2009.
Abdullah was not able to confirm the cost of the
contracts. But another Kurdish official, who spoke
on condition of anonymity because he was not
authorized to release information, said the two
projects would together cost about $300 million.
To help finance the construction, he said the
Kurdistan government would also offer four
production-sharing contracts of $800 million to
other international oil companies.
Abdullah said Iraq's Industry Ministry was assigned
in 2005 to construct the Bazian refinery but that
work halted because of disputes between Kurdish
authorities and the central government in Baghdad.
He said the refinery was about 20-30 percent
complete.
The Kurds wanted the project to be financed by the
Industry Ministry, but the central government wanted
the funds to come out of Kurdistan's allocation in
the federal budget.
"We've become hopeless with the central government,"
Abdullah told The AP in a phone interview. "In
addition to that, its teams don't have the modern
technologies and capabilities to handle such a
project.www.ekurd.net
With the national oil
and gas law stuck in dispute between the Kurds and
Arab leaders over who has the final say in managing
oil and gas fields, the Kurds have signed 15
production-sharing contracts with 20 international
oil companies.
Those contracts are considered illegal by the Iraqi
Oil Ministry, which has threatened to exclude and
blacklist participating international oil companies
from future opportunities in other parts of Iraq.
The latest threats came last month when Oil Ministry
threatened to stop all crude exports to South Korea
if that nation proceeds with a deal last November
between a state-owned consortium and the Kurdish
government.
AP
Top |
Kurd Net
does not take credit for and is not responsible for the content of news
information on this page
|
® 