Deloitte, Iraqi Kurdistan’s oil auditing firm. Offices of Deloitte, London, Britain, September 25, 2017. Photo: Reuters
HEWLÊR-Erbil, Iraq’s Kurdistan region,— The Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) on Sunday released a verification report by auditing firm Deloitte on oil production, export, consumption, and revenue in Iraq’s Kurdistan region for 2019.
According to the report, Iraqi Kurdistan’s operators pumped 170,977,784 barrels of oil during 2019, resulting in an average of 468,432 barrels per day.
In total, the Kurdish region brought in a gross of $8.438 billion for oil sales last year. Accounting for various payments, tariffs, and other costs and debits, the net cash balance it received from sales was $4.515 billion.
Exported oil brought in an average of $52.68 per barrel and locally-sold barrels went for an average of $45.94.
The vast majority of the oil pumped in Iraqi Kurdistan went for export.
In the first three months of 2018 Iraqi Kurdistan generated more than $1.663 billion USD in revenue from oil sales .
The Kurdistan Regional Government signed a contract with Deloitte in 2015 in an effort to provided transparency about its oil sales.
But the oil auditing firm Deloitte has been accused of sign off accounts of bank that funded drug barons, terrorists.
In 2016 Kurdistan Prime Minister Nechirvan Barzani at that time (current president of Kurdistan) said that KRG won’t permit the Deloitte and Ernst & Young companies – international audit firms – to see the terms of an energy agreement it has with Turkey.
For many years, transparency organizations, lawmakers, observers, and international organizations have accused senior Iraq’s Kurdistan Regional Government KRG officials of corruption, especially with regard to expropriation of the Kurdistan’s oil income.
Kurdistan considered as the most corrupted part of Iraq. According to Kurdish lawmakers and leaked documents billions of dollars are missing from Iraqi Kurdistan’s oil revenues.
The ruling Barzani clan have been routinely accused by critics and oberevers of neptunism and amassing huge wealth from oil business for the family instead of serving the population. KDP party leader and ex-president Massoud Barzani remains the most powerful leader in the shadow according to analysts. Massoud’s son Masrour is the Kurdistan region’s prime minister and his nephew Nechirvan Barzani is president of Kurdistan.
Moscow and Riyadh reached a deal on April 12 to cut oil production by 9.7 million bpd – equivalent to 10 percent of the world’s daily supply – for May and June. Global demand will remain low, however, as a result of the coronavirus pandemic and the economic downturn it has sparked.
OPEC producers and allies agreed to continue the reduction until April next year.
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