Iraqi forces yesterday appeared poised to take full control of the oil fields in the disputed northern province of Kirkuk, dashing Kurdish hopes of creating a viable independent state.
Kurdish Peshmerga forces withdrew without a fight after federal government troops and militia entered the city of Kirkuk, seizing the provincial governor’s office and key military bases in response to a Kurdish vote for independence last month.
The oil fields taken on Tuesday accounted for more than 400,000 of the 650,000 barrels per day that the autonomous Kurdish region used to export in defiance of Baghdad.
Photo: Reuters
Their loss deals a huge blow to its already dire finances and its dreams of economic self-sufficiency.
On Tuesday morning, Iraqi forces took down the Kurdish flags that had flown over the pumping stations of the Bai Hassan and Havana oil fields, and raised the national flag, a photographer said.
Kurdish technicians had halted production and fled on Monday evening as pro-government forces approached.
The last Kirkuk oil field still in Kurdish hands is the smaller Khurmala field, south of Arbil, which produces about 10,000 barrels per day.
Oil exports through Turkey — both from Kirkuk and from within the Kurdish autonomous region — make up a major portion of the autonomous Kurdish government’s revenue.
Baghdad views them as a breach of the constitution, under which they are a federal responsibility.
The autonomous Kurdish region is suffering a crushing economic crisis after Baghdad severed its air links with the outside world and neighboring Iran closed its border to petrochemical exports.
Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi said on Tuesday that the independence poll was now “a thing of the past.”
“Central authority must be imposed everywhere in Iraq,” al-Abadi told a news conference. “I want to be fair with all citizens.”
Iraqi President Fuad Masum blamed the independence poll for triggering Baghdad’s operation.
“Holding a referendum on the Kurdistan region’s independence from Iraq stirred grave disagreements between the central government and the government of Kurdistan,” Masum, himself Kurdish, said in a televised address on Tuesday.
That “led to federal security forces retaking direct control of Kirkuk,” Masum said.
Global crude oil prices rose further early yesterday on investor fears of output disruptions.
French geographer and Kurdistan specialist Cyril Roussel said the loss of the oil fields had slashed Kurdish finances by half.
“It spells the end of Kurdistan’s economic self-sufficiency and of the dream of independence,” Roussel said.
He said that without the revenue from Kirkuk oil, the autonomous region would never have embarked on the Sept. 25 referendum in which Kurds overwhelmingly backed independence.
“It was only after the annexation of the two Kirkuk fields in July 2014 that Kurdish President Massud Barzani started to talk of independence. Before, he spoke only of autonomy,” Roussel said.
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