Kurds News | Al Jazeera Skip linksSkip to Contentplay Live Sign upShow navigation menuNavigation menuNewsShow more news sectionsAfrica.
Despite efforts by the government to distance itself and not take sides or allow attacks on Iran from its territories, the repercussions were heavy on the semi-autonomous region and Iraq as a whole.
list 1 of 4Iraq’s Kurdish region wants to stay out of regional conflicts: PM Barzani.
list 2 of 4Turkiye approves pardon-like bill for thousands of PKK fighters.
list 3 of 4Former Iraqi provincial governor arrested as graft crackdown continues.
list 4 of 4Iran hierarchy consolidation as IRGC veteran tapped for key security role.
Since the outbreak of the war in February, hundreds of missiles and drones have hit the Kurdish region.
Masrour Barzani, prime minister of the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG), told Al Jazeera the region has ”paid a heavy price” in the war.
According to KRG data, the attacks hit military and security sites, energy facilities, bases and headquarters of opposition Iranian Kurdish parties, in addition to civilian areas.
A direct casualty of these attacks is the economy: The oil and gas sectors, and the movement of companies and investment. And it comes at a time when the Kurdish region is facing a chronic financial crisis amid ongoing disputes with the federal government in Baghdad over salary payments for state employees, oil sales, and revenues.
Kurdish authorities say they have named the perpetrators behind the attacks and provided them to the central government in Baghdad.
Within hours of the US-Israel attacks on Iran, US assets in Iraq’s semi-autonomous Kurdish region came under retaliatory attacks from Tehran-backed groups, dragging the country into the conflict that has since expanded across the Middle East and beyond.
Since then, US assets in Iraq have come under multiple attacks from pro-Iran groups and Iran’s powerful Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC). In response, the US has also carried out attacks against the Iraqi groups.
The IRGC has also attacked Iranian Kurdish groups based in the Iraqi Kurdish region, after reports that Washington planned to arm them to fight Tehran. Last week, the leader of an Iranian Kurdish nationalist group based in the Kurdish region told Al Jazeera that it is “highly likely” that Iranian Kurds will stage a cross-border ground operation into Iran.
During the war, Iraq was also attacked. Drone and rocket attacks have hit Baghdad International Airport, which houses a military base and a US diplomatic facility, as well as oilfields and other facilities.
For many in the Kurdish region, the Iran-backed armed groups are a cause of destabilisation and a source of concern.
Jabbar Yawar, security expert and former secretary-general of the Ministry of Peshmerga in the KRG, said these groups do not adhere to the orders of the Iraqi government.
But economic worries are also weighing heavily not just on the Kurdish region but the whole of Iraq. Its Ministry of Oil announced a case of force majeure on all oilfields developed by foreign oil companies, citing disruptions to navigation through the Strait of Hormuz that have halted most of the country’s crude exports.
Force majeure is an unforeseeable event that prevents a contract from being fulfilled. In this case, the Iraqi government has ordered a shutdown in oil production and no compensation to be paid to the foreign firms under their contracts.
The crisis comes at a time when the government of Prime Minister Ali al-Zaidi was proposing an economic programme based on implementing the “Development Road” project and expanding partnerships with the private sector and international companies, in an attempt to restructure the economy and reduce its reliance on oil.
However, the closure of the Strait of Hormuz exposed the limits of Iraq’s ability to face crises. The halt in oil exports led to a sharp decline in revenues, compounded by the stalling of projects to diversify export outlets through Turkiye, Syria, Jordan, and Saudi Arabia due to years-long political disputes, leaving the government facing an unprecedented financial strain.
For Erbil, the continuation or expansion of the war could turn the security concerns into a deeper economic crisis, especially if the shutdown of oil and gas production is prolonged, or the attacks on energy facilities continue.
Aland Kareem Salih, an economy researcher and vice president at the Vision Foundation for Strategic Studies, warns a total shutdown of oil exports could be disastrous for the Kurdish region.
Fears in the region’s main cities – Erbil, Sulaymaniya and Duhok – are growing not only because of the attacks, but over the possibility of the region turning into a permanent arena for settling scores between Iran and its proxies versus the US and its allies.
Fontes
Informação baseada em material público de Al Jazeera, reescrito pela redação ULTRA NOTÍCIAS.
