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Kurdistan oil deals might be solved at
federal court, Iraqi minister says
10.3.2008
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March 10, 2008
BAGHDAD,-- Iraq's oil minister on Monday said
the government is ready to solve in a federal court
the issue of the oil deals unilaterally inked by the
Kurdistan region government with foreign companies.
The Kurds, a key group within the national governing
coalition, have argued that their production-sharing
contracts are not against the Iraqi constitution and
planned to refer the dispute with the central
government to the high federal court.
"The (high) federal court can review any dispute and
we don't have any doubt that the only one who has
the authority to sign contracts is the federal
government in Baghdad according to the
constitution," said Oil Minister Hussein
al-Shahristani. |
Dr. Hussein Shahristani, Iraq's Oil Minister |
"Any contract signed without the approval of the Oil
Ministry and central authority in Baghdad will not
be considered legal and Iraq is not committed to
it," he told reporters at the ministry.
He added that these companies should have notified
the central government and sought its approval
before signing any contracts.
Last Saturday, al-Shahristani said the Baghdad will
block the oil deals, taking the months-old dispute a
step forward.
A national oil and gas law is stuck in parliament,
with Kurdish and Arab leaders fighting over who has
the final say in managing oil and gas fields.
In the interim, the Kurds have signed 15
production-sharing contracts with 20 international
oil companies after drafting their own oil and gas
law.
Those contracts are considered illegal by the Iraqi
Oil Ministry, which has threatened to exclude and
blacklist the international oil companies from
future opportunities in other parts of Iraq.
As of Dec. 31, Iraq's oil ministry terminated South
Korea's SK Energy's term contract to import Basra
crude oil because it refused to abandon its
exploration project in the autonomous Kurdistan
region as part of a consortium led by the state-run
Korea National Oil Corp.
In January, the ministry decided to annul a
memorandum of understanding the ministry had with
international oil companies participating in
production-sharing contracts with the Kurds.
Four companies are thought to have agreements with
both the oil ministry and with the Kurdistan
regional government: the United Arab Emirates'
Crescent,www.ekurd.net
Canada's Western Oil
Sands and Heritage Oil, India's Reliance Industries
and Austria's OMV.
In February, Iraq halted oil exports to Austria's
OMV, the leading oil and gas group in central
Europe, to protest an oil deal with the Kurdish
regional administration in Kurdistan 'northern
Iraq'.
Kurdistan prime minister Nechirvan Barzani said
earlier that all energy deals are constitutional.
"It was within the constitutional rights," Barzani
said.
AP | AFP
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