In Muqtada Al-Sadr’s meeting with his deputies on the evening of the 15th of June, Sadr dismissed doubts about the possibility of retracting the resignation of his representatives. This is what makes the Shiite coordination framework bear the responsibility of managing the following stage, while previously they were only wishing to participate.
When Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu, had met in Ankara on Wednesday, 8 June, the fiery statements issued by senior Turkish officials and President Erdoğan, regarding an imminent Turkish military operation in areas in the north and northeast Syria, have decreased.
After eight months of conflict and political deadlock, Muqtada Al-Sadr extricated himself from bearing the responsibility of political and governmental crisis. Sadr implemented his threat of withdrawing from the Parliament. Some reasons for Sadr’s withdrawal are personal, and some are related to his vision of confronting his Shiite rivals. However, this withdrawal created a significant imbalance in the political process, and since June 12th evening, the fate of Iraq has become unknown.
Iraq’s oil ministry has issued two letters and tried two different ways this month and increased its attempts to seize and remove oil and gas companies from dealing with the Kurdistan Region. First, by sending a letter to international oil and gas companies in the Kurdistan Region to deal directly with the State Organization for Marketing of Oil (SOMO).
After Muqtada al-Sadr’s one-month deadline bore no fruit, the Shiite Coordination Framework and Sadr, who leads the parliament’s largest bloc with 74 seats, put forth different suggestions to put an end to the political deadlock. However, none of the initiatives has helped end the impasse yet.
The day after the recent tensions between the Iraqi army and the YBŞ on March 2, Iraqi Commander-in-Chief Abdul Amir Rashid Yarallah went to Shingal. Then the military declared that “Shingal is safe now.” Occasionally, the relations between the Iraqi army and YBŞ get cold blood, and they face each other.
Three big Russian oil companies have the capital of about $14 billion in investment in the field of oil and gas in the Iraq and Kurdistan region. Gazprom produces 30,000 barrels of oil and 40 million cubic feet of gas daily in the Sarqala field, and Lukoil produces about 500,000 barrels of oil at the Western Qurna2 oil field in Basra.
The Turkish Defense Minister announced the claw-lock operation in the Metina, Zap and Avashin-Basyan areas. And it looks like it’s an extension of the same seven operations called the Claw, which started in May 2019.
On March 7, 2022, the price of one barrel of oil has raised to 140$, which is the highest price record for the past 12 years. The increase was in ways that in less than 24 hours, the price raised 30% percent, following the announcement from Biden administration and U.S. Congress that they are preparing a ruling to ban oil importation from Russia
The attack in Erbil is part of a continued Iran policy, but this time it comes at a sensitive time for Iraq, the Middle East and the World; it is a direct or indirect targeting of an area or a place that it sees as its enemy.
The politicized ruling of Iraqi Federal Supreme Court on February 15, 2022, emerged great risks and oppositely great opportunities to the future of Kurdistan Region oil and gas industry, in which we need to, analyze the decision in terms of current changes and future contributors of global energy security providers. In this analysis, the risks of petitioning cases against Kurdistan Region oil and gas in the international courts, submission of new cases on the companies, and opportunities in front of Kurdistan Region oil and more especially gas industry, will be discussed.
Kurdistan is about 1500 kilometers far from the Donbas region where Russia has generated the instability. However, the political effect of the crisis on Kurds is not as far as the geographical distance.
In the past few days, Qais al-Khazali, leader of Asaib Ahl al-Haq (AAH), had an engaging interview with BBC. His statements are important to help understand the negotiations of government formation and Iran’s role in Iraq.
The high price of oil, which stays above $70 for 2021, took the Iraqi oil income to above 76 billion US dollars which were almost close to the income of 2019. This income is $27 billion more than what has been stated to be the income for 2021.
Kurdish jihadism already has a 40-year history. It has gone through various stages: from the Islamisation of the Kurdish struggle (Islamic Movement of Kurdistan) to the internationalization of the Islamic struggle (Ansar al-Islam). More recently, from 2012 to 2017, the new generation of Kurdish jihadists entered a reterritorialization process of their armed struggle and joined the Islamic State.
The Iraqi early elections finally took place, but as it was expected after a day of silence the political blocs started to protest and reject early results, and the likely scenarios and talks to form next cabinet may take longer time.
The early elections on October 10th 2021 is for the fifth term of Iraqi parliament, but from now eyes are intensifying on the position of next Prime Minister which will get confidence from parliament and to decide on these talks there are some likely scenarios to form future Iraqi government.
The Iranian parliament approved new ministers of the Iranian government last week except minister of education, this means approving 18 ministerial picks of Ebrahim Raisi. New ministers officially took office and this means end of eight years of Hassan Rohani’s cabinet. But this is not just end of moderate Rohani’s government!
