An attack on the Iraqi oil pipeline to the Turkish port of Ceyhan last night is expected to knock out Iraq’s oil exports for at least ten days, according to Turkish energy ministry officials contacted by Reuters.
The explosion, which occurred late last night, has led to the complete close of exports of Iraqi crude via the pipeline. Reuters reports that the attack happened in Mardin province, inside the Turkish border above its boundary with Syria.
According to Reuters, the Firat news agency, which is described as being close to the PKK, attributes the attack within Turkish territory to the terrorist Kurdish separatist group.
In June, 9.5 million barrels were pumped from Kirkuk to Ceyhan, brining in $874 million, according to figures published by Iraq’s State Oil Marketing Organisation. SOMO set the August price for Kirkuk crude to Europe – its chief destination – at a discount of $1.15 a barrel relative to the North Sea (Dated Brent) benchmark.
On the basis of these figures, the explosion will deprive Iraq of around $341 million of oil export revenue in August.
The PKK have repeatedly targeted oil pipelines running along the Turkish side of the Turkey-Iraq and Turkey-Syria borders, as part of a long-running violent campaign to claim Kurdish sovereignty inside Turkey.
The Kurdish regional government is pressing ahead with an oil export pipeline to the Turkish border, in order to be able to export crude without using Iraq’s central pipeline network.
At the bidding of natural resources minister Ashti Hawrami, DNO International, Genel Energy and KAR had agreed to restart flows to the Kirkuk-Ceyhan pipeline at a rate of 100,000 barrels a day, in an ostensible effort to patch up severely degraded relations with Baghdad over oil policy.
Â
Â
