Azerbaijan, Baku, Oct. 17 / Trend A. Taghiyeva /
Iraq needs to cut oil supplies to Turkey in response to Ankara's interference in Iraq's internal affairs, Iraqi official Iskander Witwit told Trend on Wednesday.
"The Iraqi government must reconsider oil agreements with Turkey in response to Ankara's policy of interfering in the internal affairs of the country," he added.
He added that Turkey cooperates with the Kurdish autonomy in the oil sector, bypassing the Iraqi government. This is unacceptable because Turkey's action is a threat to Iraq's stability.
"We offered the Iraqi parliament to stop or reduce oil supply to Turkey," he said. "Instead of Turkey, Iraq could export oil to Syria, which has great demand for energy resources."
Iraq is Turkey's major economic partner. So, ceasing oil supply to Turkey is the right action to prevent Turkey's interfering in Iraq's internal affairs.
Previously, the Iraqi Oil Ministry stated that Baghdad will apply sanctions against Turkish companies, if any of them signs an oil and gas deal with the Kurdish government without the permission of the central government.
In September, Iraq increased its oil exports to 2.600 million barrels per day. According to BP, Iraq's proven oil reserves as of late 2011 amounted to 143.1 billion barrels, placing the country third in OPEC after Saudi Arabia and Iran.
Oil production in Iraq as of late 2011 was 2.798 million barrels per day.