LONDON — The autonomous region of Kurdistan has expressed readiness to share crude oil revenues with the rest of Iraq.
Kurdistan Natural Resources Minister Ashti Hawrami said the regional government plans to draft an oil bill over the next few weeks that would share revenues with the rest of the country, Middle East Newsline reported.
But the bill would grant Kurdistan the sole right to develop resources in the northern Iraqi province.
"Control of the new fields is the exclusive right of the regions and we are not going to budge on that," Hawrami said. "We will control them 100 percent. We have no intention of withholding revenue from the central government. We will not take a dollar extra than our fair share, but we expect our fair share."
In a London briefing to potential investors last week, Hawrami said the Kurdistan government intends to reach agreement with foreign companies during October 2006. The government has already signed accords with companies from Canada, Norway and Turkey to develop oil reserves in Kurdistan.