Turkey, Iraq sign one-year oil pipeline deal

Ankara and Baghdad on Saturday agreed to extend an oil pipeline agreement by one year, just days after a top-level visit by Iraqi Prime Ali al-Zaidi, officials on both sides said. In a post on X, Energy Minister Alparslan Bayraktar said the agreement was signed following a "productive meeting" in Ankara with Iraqi Oil Minister Bassem Mohammed Khudair. Zaidi also hailed the deal in a post on X, describing it as "an important strategic milestone" which would involve "a minimum export capacity of 750,000 barrels per day".

The decades-old agreement on the pipeline -- which carries Iraqi crude to Turkey's Mediterranean export terminal of Ceyhan, a key outlet for regional oil shipments -- had expired on Monday. "While our efforts continue toward a new long-term agreement for this pipeline.. we have implemented this transit arrangement covering a daily capacity of 750,000 barrels," Bayraktar wrote.

Zaidi said Iraqi and Turkish companies would begin implementing the agreement. Turkey and Iraq signed a one-year agreement on maintaining use of the crude oil pipeline between the ?two countries, Turkish Energy Minister Alparslan Bayraktar said on Saturday. The agreement extended a decades-long bilateral arrangement that expired on Monday which allows the operation of Baghdad's only functioning export pipeline, the Iraq-Turkey Pipeline (ITP).

Bayraktar said he had a "productive" meeting in Ankara with Iraq's oil minister and his delegation and ?they signed the one-year deal between Turkish state energy company BOTAS and Iraq's state oil companies SOMO and NOC. The extension allows time for talks on a more comprehensive agreement. Turkey wants the pipeline, with a capacity of 1.5 million barrels per day (bpd), to be fully utilised and possibly extended to southern Iraqi oil fields.

The pipeline to the Turkish port of Ceyhan currently carries around 170,000 bpd, according to Turkish data.