By Kamal Chomani: There is no state in this world as backward as Saudi Arabia in the Middle East. There is no election, no human rights, no freedom, and no freedom of speech. The thugs of MBS, Mohammed Bin Salman, the Saudi ruler, managed to cut the prominent Saudi journalist, Jamal Khashoggi into pieces inside the…
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Category Archives: Oil
KRG On The Eve Of Oil Calamity
By Arian Mufid: The biggest campaign in the world today is against the coronavirus pandemic. The world’s governments, in order to save human capital, have ordered lockdowns in towns and cities including shops, malls, factories and also airports. As a result, there is no travel between countries and cities all over the world. There is…
Oil Curse Symptoms in the Kurdistan Region
By Shwan Sharey: The production and export of oil in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq (KRI) shows signs of the oil curse that exists across the region. The Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG), a sub-state actor, like the Gulf and African states exhibits signs of this oil curse. These include a lack of transparency in energy…
OIL: The Reason for Patriarchy
By Haore Burhan: Compared to other regions around the world, we can see a quite distinctive gap regarding gender equality in the Middle East. For decades, historians, scientists and researchers claimed and believed that the main reason behind gender inequality in the Middle East was Islam. The dominant religion in the Middle East, Islam, was…
Norway, Nigeria and the Kurdistan Region’s Oil Policy
By Twana Ahmed Xeyat: “Who became rich from oil in his country?” “Nobody and everybody”. The question was asked by John Campbell, a former United State Ambassador to Nigeria, and the answer was given by a Norwegian diplomat. That Norway should be so wealthy is no surprise. It is the world’s fifth-largest oil exporter, with annual…
The Economic Turbulence in the South of Kurdistan
By Arian Mufid: For the last ten years Kurdish politics has suffered great corruption in the hands of the Kurdistam Regional Government (KRG) leadership. Here we are today with yet more evidence of the results of the mismanagement of our leaders, with the wages and salaries of Kurdish civil servants not being paid for the…
Ignoring Self-Determination: The Imperialist Agenda and The Artificial Failed State of Iraq
By M.I. Augustine: From the time Cyrus the Great of Iran conquered Babylon in 539 B.C., all the way until British cartographers created something called “Iraq” in 1920, the area along the Tigris and the Euphrates rivers was never a united political entity. Due to one very important business interest, the British, after WWI, clumsily drew…
Genel Energy Demands $375 Million From KRG
By Aland Mahwy: Ten days after the London court ruling against the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) in its long standing dispute with Dana Gas, the Anglo-Turkish exploration and production company, Genel Energy, is demanding the KRG pays it, within one month, $375 million. On 13 July 2015, Genel Energy’s chairman, Tony Hayward, said his company…
The Disputes Between Dana Gas and the KRG
By Harem Karem & Aland Mahwy: In a letter to the Abu Dhabi Bourse on 22 October 2013 (as required under the freedom of information law), Hamid Jafar, of Dana Gas and a former advisor to the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG), revealed that he had filed a court case in London demanding $430 million from the…
$7.3 billion on KRG fuel imports could have been saved with affordable gas: Luay al-Khatteeb
Interview by Harem Karem: Luay al-Khatteeb is a nonresident fellow in the Brookings Doha Center and founder of Iraq Energy Institute, focusing on the geopolitics and political economy of the GCC and Iraq. His experiences in the private sector span more than 20 years, and he is a frequent commentator on issues related to energy…
Are Kurds Following Other Rentier States?
By Hanar Marouf: What sort of society are we going to produce by only paving an easy economic development? In light of the new global force, gloabalization, with its far-reaching impact on the future of nation-states, it is important to look at how Kurdistan is affected by taking the easy path in developing its economic situation…
Who benefits from low oil prices?
By Issa Chomani: Over six months, oil prices have dramatically reduced by half and recorded their lowest levels. This comes after nearly five years of stability. The prices are not expected to bounce back anytime soon. In June the Brent crude price was around $115 a barrel; now is seen to have stabilized at about…
A New Strategy for Kurdistan’s Oil and Gas
By Rebwar Rashed: Kurdish Oil and Gas and JPMorgan Chase & Co. The so called ‘Resolution process’ which was launched by the Turkish AKP government and was announced by then Turkish Prime minister Mr. Erdogan on 28 December 2012, has up to the present day not resulted in anything positive for the Kurdish people. The…
The Kurds’ Crude Making Americans Cheerful
By Dr. M. Koohzad: This article first appeared on CounterPunch Americans are very happy to see the price of fuel especially gasoline falling before the beginning of the cold season. They are smiling, happy, laughing, giggling, and even shouting at prices beyond their imagination. The price of gasoline has been decreasing since April and by…
13.7m barrels of Kurd oil shipped from Turkey since May, says Yildiz
KT News: The war with ISIS has not adversely affected the Kurdistan Region’s burgeoning direct oil exports via Turkey. Since May, Kurd oil delivered to Turkey’s Mediterranean port of Ceyhan has been loaded onto 19 tankers shipping 13.7 million barrels of crude oil, Turkish Energy Minister Taner Yildiz told Reuters today. “The flow of Kurdish…
