ERBIL (Kurdistan 24) – Jordanian Minister of Energy and Mineral Resources Hala Zawati said this week that Iraq would soon complete preparations to start supplying her country with 10,000 barrels per day (bpd) of oil from the disputed province of Kirkuk.
Iraq agreed in January to provide Jordan with oil from the Baiji refinery relying on a price formula that is equal to the rate for Brent crude, a benchmark price for purchases of oil worldwide, minus transport costs and differing specifications.
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Zawati was quoted by the Ammon news website as saying that the necessary procedures to start the transfer are in their final stages and exports to Jordan would start in a short time, though she did not give a specific date.
She stressed that there are no outstanding issues that would hinder the successful arrival of the Iraqi oil in Jordan.
The Energy and Mineral Resources Minister previously announced that the oil would start arriving at the end of July but apparent complications have pushed back the date.
Zawati traveled to Iraq earlier this year for a meeting with government officials in Baghdad following a visit by the country’s monarch, King Abdullah, a first since 2008.
Iraq and Jordan signed a 2013 pipeline agreement worth about $18 billion and announced that multiple financing options would be considered. The Jordanian port of Aqaba, on the northern tip of the Red Sea, has long been a route for Iraqi imports and exports.
A 1,700 km pipeline will have to be built from Iraq's southern port of Basra, through the province of Najaf and vast desert regions of embattled Anbar Province, into Jordan, and down again to the southern port of Aqaba.
Editing by John J. Catherine