Relations between the central government in Baghdad and the Kurdistan regional government in Erbil have never been easy since 2003. More than a friendship, it was a ceasefire. In the midst of difficult negotiations between Iraqi parties to form the new executive after the October 2021 elections, a new problem has arisen between the two governments.
With great delay, Baghdad’s federal supreme court ruled that the oil and gas law enacted by the Kurdistan government in 2007 was contrary to the federal constitution, which considers oil (including that of Kurdistan) to be Iraqi national wealth.
The president of the Democratic Party of Kurdistan, Massud Barzani, considers it a political decision, not a legal one, aimed at putting pressure on autonomous Kurdistan to renounce its constitutional rights. Iraqi President Barham Saleh, also a Kurd, has criticized all parties, including his Patriotic Union of Kurdistan, for their more than ten-year hesitation to pass a law regulating the management of oil and gas resources across the country. which led to the current delicate situation. Saleh has called for serious and urgent negotiations to resolve the problem.
Prime Minister Mustafa al Kadhimi held an urgent summit and asked the oil minister to communicate with the Kurdistan Regional Government to prepare mechanisms and initiatives to handle the issue according to constitutional norms and the supreme national interest. It will not be easy. The problem is that the Kurdish autonomous government has been acting since 2007 based on its legislation with no objection from the central government.
According to the decision of the supreme court, the Kurdistan government will have to return all the sums collected from the extraction of oil from 2007 to today. It is a heavy request, at a time when Kurdish government employees are still awaiting payment of back wages by Baghdad. The court’s decision at this delicate moment will add a new problem to the many puzzles that already complicate the formation of a new government.
(Translation by Francesco De Lellis)