Türkiye Announces Resumption of Iraq-Türkiye Oil Pipeline Shipments

(MENAFN) Crude oil began flowing again through the Iraq-Türkiye pipeline early Saturday morning following a lengthy suspension, Turkish Energy and Natural Resources Minister Alparslan Bayraktar confirmed.

“Oil shipments resumed through the Iraq-Türkiye pipeline at 7.07 am local time (0407GMT) on Saturday,” Bayraktar announced on Turkish social media platform NSosyal.

The pipeline, a major export route for oil from Iraq’s semi-autonomous Kurdish region, had been out of operation since the devastating earthquakes of February 6, 2023. Although Turkish pipeline operator BOTAS completed restoration work by October last year, resumption of exports had been delayed pending coordination with Iraqi authorities.

On the same day, an Iraqi news agency reported that oil exports from the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) fields in northern Iraq were officially underway again.

According to media, the restart at the Fishkhabur pumping station involved coordination between the KRG, the Iraqi federal government, and several oil companies.

The move follows a Thursday statement from Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shiaa al-Sudani, who said that crude from KRG oilfields would once again be exported via the Türkiye-bound pipeline.

“Today we reached a historic agreement under which the Federal Ministry of Oil will receive crude oil produced from the fields in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq and export it through the Iraq-Türkiye pipeline,” al-Sudani said through the US social media company X.

Ahead of the restart, the KRG had disclosed that it had finalized contracts with both local and international oil firms, awaiting final approval from Iraq’s Ministry of Oil to greenlight exports.

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