Page 5 - MEOG Week 50 2020

MEOG COMMENTARY MEOG

provides for Baghdad to borrow around $10bn Ramyar Abdul-Rahman, director of the
to cover the fiscal deficit that has come about Sarqala sub-district, said: “The oil company was
because of the drop in oil prices as well as for the exporting roughly 25,000 bpd via 110 oil trucks
delayed salary payments. on a daily basis, but now exports have been
This was followed by the tender and subse- halted until the situation eases.”
quent award to China’s Zhenhua Oil Co. of a five- He added: “Gazprom was concerned that the
year term crude supply tender based on a $2bn oil trucks would potentially be targeted by the
pre-payment targeted to bolster state coffers. demonstrators in the cities of Kurdistan where
Given that the federal government is under- people have taken to the streets.”
stood to be running at a deficit of around $3bn The move appears prudent, with the unrest
per month, the KRG’s extended hand is just one already having led to buildings being set alight.
of several looking for money and its need is likely Meanwhile in a seemingly unrelated incident,
to be exacerbated by the protests which last week bombs exploded at two wells in Kirkuk Prov-
stopped loading from the Sarqala oilfield in the ince’s Khabbaz oilfield, taking around 2,000 bpd
Garmian licence near Sulaymaniyah. of the field’s 26,000 bpd capacity offline.
Having only last month announced the Security workers in Kirkuk said that militants
upcoming expansion of production at the field from IS were responsible for the attack, under-
from 24,000 bpd to 32,000 bpd, Gazprom Neft lining the precarious situation northern Iraq
stopped loading trucks in case of attacks. continues to face.™

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