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Kurdish lawmaker rules out oil, gas law to
be passed this term
24.6.2008
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June
24, 2008
BAGHDAD, — A leading Kurdish legislator
ruled out that the draft law on oil and gas would be
passed during the current legislative term.
Dr Mahmoud Othman, a key member of the Kurdistan
Coalition (KC), voiced optimism about solving
outstanding issues between the autonomous Iraqi
Kurdistan region and central governments during the
visit being paid by the region's Prime Minister,
Nechirvan Barzani, to Baghdad.
Barzani's visit to Baghdad would "solve many pending
issues between the central and Iraqi Kurdistan
governments,www.ekurd.net
but I don't think the
draft on oil and gas would be passed during this
legislative term," Othman told VOI.
The KC is the second largest bloc in the Iraqi
parliament with 55 out of a total 275 seats.
On Sunday a lawmaker said a visit by Barzani to
Baghdad is "required" in order to resolve
outstanding issues between the two sides. |
Dr
Mahmoud Othman, a Kurdish legislator, member of the
Kurdistan National Democratic Union |
"The pending issues need
more consultations and coordination by the two
governments," Jalal al-Din al-Saghir, a member of
parliament from the Shiite Unified Iraqi Coalition (UIC),
said.
Iraq's central government had declined to recognize
the oil contracts concluded by Iraqi Kurdistan with
foreign corporations to explore and invest oil
fields within the autonomous region and also refused
to pay the salaries of more than 190,000 personnel
of the region's peshmerga guards from the central
defence ministry budget.
The peshmerga are irregular forces loyal to the two
main Kurdish parties: Iraqi President Jalal
Talabani's Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) and
Iraqi Kurdistan President Massoud Barzani's
Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP).
These forces were merged into the Iraqi army after
foreign troops entered the country and toppled the
ruling regime in 2003.
Falah Mustafa, the official in charge of the Iraqi
Kurdistan region's foreign relations, had said on
Saturday that Barzani arrived in Baghdad on Saturday
on a visit to offer fresh proposals for Iraqi Prime
Minister Nouri al-Maliki pertaining to the law on
oil and gas and financial appropriations for the
peshmerga forces,www.ekurd.net
or Region's Guards, from
the federal budget.
Copyright, respective author or news agency, VOI
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