Iraq sends money to pay Kurdish salaries for first time since 2014
baghdad — Iraq sent money to pay salaries of state employees in the Kurdish region on Monday for the first time since 2014, the Baghdad government said, although a dispute over how much it will send the Kurds in future remains unresolved.
Monday’s agreement represents a step towards normalising relations between the central government and the autonomous Kurdish region, which held a vote for independence last year that the central government swiftly crushed.
Under the constitution, the Kurdish region is entitled to a share of the national budget. But that arrangement collapsed in 2014, when Iraq’s army fled the north in the face of an advance by Daesh militants. The Kurds seized control of Iraq’s main northern oil fields at Kirkuk from Daesh and began selling Kirkuk’s oil independently; Baghdad stopped sending money to the Kurds.
Last year, after Daesh was driven out of the north, the Kurds held an independence referendum, voting overwhelmingly to secede. But the central government responded by swiftly launching a military offensive and recapturing control of Kirkuk, which quashed the Kurdish independence bid.
The central government and the Kurds have yet to agree on a full plan to resume payments from Baghdad to the Kurdish region.
The 2018 budget, passed in parliament earlier this month despite a boycott by Kurdish lawmakers, calls for the 17 percent of total revenue allocated to the Kurds to be cut in line with the region’s share of Iraq’s population, which is disputed.
The Kurdish region still conducts independent oil sales, although it has far less oil to sell now that it no longer controls Kirkuk. “The federal finance ministry transferred a cash sum of 317 billion Iraqi dinars ($267 million) to the region’s finance ministry,” Baghdad government spokesman Saad Al Hadithi said.
Hadithi said the transfer would cover the Kurdistan Regional Government’s (KRG) salaries for a month. —