The Oil Deal That Could Break Up Iraq

Since the formation of the new system of governance in Iraq in 2003 immediately after the fall of Saddam Hussein there have been a slew of problems between the Federal Government of Iraq (FGI), centred in Baghdad, and the semi-autonomous Kurdistan Region of Iraq (KRI), governed in large part by its government (the KRG) based in Erbil. Back then in 2003/4 it was broadly agreed that the KRG would export a certain volume of oil from its own fields and Kirkuk via the FGI’s State Oil Marketing Organization (SOMO) and would absolutely not independently…