Kurdistan's Oil Export Saga Continues

The Iraqi federal government and the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) cut a deal earlier this week to resume the export via pipeline of some 450,000 bpd of Kurdish oil to Turkey. Flows have not resumed as of the time of writing, but the atmosphere was one of optimism.  The deal essentially means the Iraqi Kurds will be giving up some of their autonomy. In this case, it is autonomy that Baghdad claims was unconstitutional to begin with: The right to directly sell oil to the market, bypassing the Iraqi federal oil marketer, SOMO. The international…