Exxon Mobil Corporation(NYSE:XOM) decided
to pull out of its oil project in Iraq, which was a flagship project. The
company had signed a deal with the northern Kurdish region, which is an
autonomous place, thereby upsetting the officials in Baghdad. The central
government in Iraq considers deals made with that region without government
permission, to be illegal, and therefore, against the official aspects.
The project will be left by Exxon
Mobil, and the oil company will be focusing instead, on the oilfield in
southern Iraq called the West Qurna-1. This oilfield is a huge one, and the oil
company has shown keen interest in developing this place, instead of focusing
on the disputed area, which can cause a lot of trouble, which might blow up
into a big political issue. If the word of the diplomatic sources is to be
believed, then the company stands to gain a lot from the new project, since it
is said to rake in a lot of profits in the future. The profitability of the
Kurdish Project on the other hand, might not be so lucrative. The sources
confirmed this news on Thursday.
Hussain al-Shahristani happens to be
Iraq’s Deputy Prime Minister for Energy, and the oil company has informed him
of their actions and their plans for the future. The U.S State Department has
also been notified of the change of decisions by Exxon Mobil, so as to not let
trouble brew in the future. The U.S officials said that this was Exxon’s way of
telling Baghdad that they were going to leave, and look around for other
lucrative options instead.
Shahristani did not talk about Exxon
wanting to pull out of the deal. He declined to comment on whether they were,
in fact, doing so. He instead, said that the law still remained. Baghdad was
still going to hold on to the fact that deals were not to be made with
Kurdistan without the approval of the officials at Baghdad. The Kurdistan
Regional Government was not the only body which needed to give out the
permission. Exxon has declined to comment about this issue.
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