Iraq’s Kurdistan ready to export oil according to Baghdad govt.’s export level, official:

BAGHDAD / IraqiNews.com: North Iraq’s Kurdistan Regional Government has expressed readiness to export the quantity of oil, assigned by the Central Government in Baghdad, in its general budget’s draft-law, but such decision is liable to the Kurdish demands related to the settlement of the difference in this regard with the Central government, according to Kurdistan Government’s Natural Resources Ministry’s Advisor on Monday. “The draft law, presented to the Iraqi Parliament about the state’s general budget includes an article, limiting the exportation of 150,000 barrels of Kurdistan oil per day (bpd), within the current Iraqi plan to export 2.15 million barrels of oil per day (bpd), a level that we have no objection towards, in this respect,” Dr. Ali Hassan Ballo told the Saudi-based al-Sharq al-Awasat (Middle East) Newspaper. Ballo, meanwhile, said: “We see that forcing (Kurdistan) Region’s government to implement such commitment, without achieving its demands, represents a prejudiceness of the rights of the Region, taking into consideration non-payment of the dues on the government for the campanies working in the oil sector in Kurdistan.” The Legislatures of Kurdistan Coalition and its “Change List” had withdrawn from the Iraqi Parliament’s session last Saturday, in protest against some articles of the draft-law on the general Iraqi state budget for 2011, regarding the quantities decided for oil exports from Kurdistan Region. “The dues of oil fields that were not discovered yet by the Kurdistan Region‘s government itself, but through specialized international companies, must be paid to those companies before talk about any export of oil from Kurdistan fields,” Ballo said, adding: “we must expect a possibility to increase oil exports from Kurdistan fields next year to 200,000-250,000 barrels of oil per day (bpd), but that necessitates the improvement and development of the infractructure of the oil industry, thing that won’t be achieved without the Iraqi government’s recognition of the oil contracts.” The Kurdistan official said that “non-existence of an oil and gas law in Iraq is considered the basic problem the central government is suffering from; as there is no defined legal mechanism for the sharing of power and authorities in the oil sector between Kurdistan and the Central Government – a problem that rises from this angle.” The Kudistan official warned that “in the event of the approval of the state budget’s law in its current form, the relationship between the (Kurdistan) Region and the Central Government would end, because imposing the Region to accept such legal chain shall deprive it from its resources, at a time when the Regional government needs its share from the state budget to satisfy the prerequisites of the (Kurdistan) Region and its citizens.” “The (Central) government’s position stems from its preparadness to export the quantities of oil demanded from it, but that is based on meeting the conditions and demands we had raised, forefronted with compensating the companies working in the oil sector and the recognition of the oil contracts, signed by the Kurdistan Regional government,” Dr. Ballo said. Noteworthy is that the Iraqi Council of Ministers had approved the draft-law for the state’s general budget for the year 2011, in addition to the agreement on the Finance Ministry’s addition of US$5 billions (b) for investment projects, to be financed through credits from the Central Bank of Iraq. SKH 30