Stockholm (News Agency Direkt) Iraq’s Council of Ministers has approved the agreement between Kurdistan’s Erbil adn Baghdad,deciding to pay May salaries and initiate the process for June wages. Concurrently, a decision has been made to resume oil exports.

According to regional media reports, the agreement stipulates that the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) will transfer 230,000 barrels of oil daily and 120 billion dinars monthly from non-oil revenues to the federal government.In return, the federal government is obligated to disburse salaries within the Kurdistan region.

The resumption of oil exports via the ITP pipeline, which has been closed since March 2023, is expected to benefit oil companies operating in the region, including Shamaran and Norway’s DNO, associated with the Lundin family.

Currently, oil producers in the region are selling their output on the local market at discounted rates. In recent years, media outlets in the region have frequently reported on potential progress in the recovery of the oil pipeline.

In recent days, oil producers have faced drone attacks. The industry organization for Kurdistan’s oil sector, Apikur, announced in a press release that companies are canceling oil production, impacting a total of over 200,000 barrels per day.

TDN Direkt reports that DNO’s Tawke field was also targeted by a drone on Thursday.

an analysis earlier this week by DNB Carnegie speculated that the drone attacks were carried out by pro-Iranian militias in retaliation for increased U.S. sanctions against individuals involved in Iran’s oil trade, which includes the illicit sale of Iraqi oil to Iran.

“We view yesterday’s drone attack as an indication that increasing American pressure on both the KRG and Baghdad to reopen the ITP management is beginning to have an effect,meaning the probability of a recovery is increasing,” DNB Carnegie stated in its analysis.