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Iraqi Kurdistan oil output 'could hit
200,000 bpd this year'
29.5.2010 |
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May
29, 2010
NICOSIA, — Iraqi Kurdistan could raise oil
production to 200,000 barrels per day by the end of
2010 and hopes to resume crude exports, the
autonomous region's energy minister was quoted as
saying Friday.
"Volumes could be quickly ramped up to 100,000 bpd
and hit 200,000 bpd by year end," Natural Resources
Minister Ashti Hawrami told the Middle East Economic
Survey (MEES) in its edition to appear on Monday.
Iraqi Kurdistan halted oil exports -- of about
60,000 bpd, through a pipeline to neighbouring
Turkey -- in October last year due to a payment
dispute with Baghdad.
On May 18, the federal cabinet approved a draft deal
hammered out by Hawrami and Iraq's deputy oil
minister
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KRG Minister of Natural Resources Dr. Ashti Hawrami |
for upstream Abdulkarim al-Laibi that would allow
investors in the Kurdish region to be paid for costs
and could pave the way for exports to resume.
But Hawrami stressed the deal with the central
government was only provisional until a wider oil
agreement is reached, adding Iraq's political
deadlock after inconclusive March elections was an
obstacle.
"I am optimistic, but as you know we are in the
process of forming a new government in Baghdad, so
there is a question over whether they will give the
issue the attention it requires," Hawrami told MEES.
"We all need this. Iraq needs the revenues."
Companies exploiting Kurdish oil fields, which
currently produce about 20,000 bpd, include Norway's
DNO, Turkey's Genel Energy and state-owned Chinese
firm Sinopec.
Copyright, respective author or news agency,
AFP
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