Iraq threatens to cut off oil if sanctions imposed

The speaker of Iraq’s Parliament has warned Turkey that his government would cut off the flow of oil from northern Iraq if Ankara followed through on its threat to level economic sanctions against the country.

Mahmoud al-Mashhadani’s comments came on Thursday, a day after Turkey’s top leadership agreed to recommend that the government take economic measures to force the cooperation of Iraqis against the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), which has been staging cross-border attacks against Turkish troops.

“Northern Iraq cannot be pressured,” al-Mashhadani told reporters in the Syrian capital of Damascus. “Iraq is a rich country, and if there are economic pressures, we will cut off the Ceyhan pipeline[s],” he said, referring to two oil pipelines that run from northern Iraq to Turkey’s Ceyhan oil terminal on the Mediterranean Sea.

Turkey has threatened to stage an incursion into northern Iraq if Iraqi Kurds and US-led coalition forces do not crack down on the PKK based there, particularly following an ambush Sunday that killed 12 Turkish soldiers near the border.

Today’s Zaman