Energy Minister Taner Yıldız has refuted media reports that Turkey has already undertaken a $90-million Iraqi Kurdish oil sale without waiting for Baghdad’s permission, repeating that the central Iraqi government’s approval is crucial to proceed further in an oil deal with Arbil.
“Sometimes I learn from the press that a $90-million sale has been carried out, but this is not at issue right now,” Yılıdız said on Feb. 17, speaking to reporters while meeting with Oil Platform Association board members.
“If there will be a sale, it will be within the knowledge of Baghdad and its revenues will be conveyed to them. We always say this is not Turkey’s oil, it is Iraq’s,” he stressed.
Daily Milliyet had reported Kurdish sources as saying that the first tranche of oil had been sold through the Trans Petroleum company in Singapore.
The report published on Feb. 15 claimed that the $90 million collected from the first sale was put in Turkish state-owned lender Halkbank. Sources further said the issue was brought up during Iraqi Kurdish Prime Minister Nechirvan Barzani’s meeting with Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan on Feb. 14, as he requested that Arbil’s part be paid.
“We wish for Arbil and Baghdad, two brothers, to agree between themselves and for the revenues to be yielded here to be transferred to their accounts after being blocked in Turkish banks,” Yıldız added.
Central and regional governments of Iraq have been in a long-standing dispute over the latter’s desire to export its own oil to world markets via Turkey, hurriyet informs.
