Iraqi Prime Minister visits Kurdistan to resolve oil, lands dispute

PanARMENIAN.Net - Iraq's Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki visited the Kurdistan region on Sunday, June 9 for the first time in more than two years, in an attempt to resolve a long-running dispute over oil and land that has strained Iraq's unity to the limit, Reuters said.

With the country's Shi'ite leadership facing fallout from the Syrian conflict, which has invigorated Sunni insurgents in Iraq and prompted warnings of civil war, better relations with the Kurds could ease some pressure on Maliki.

The Shi'ite premier was met on the Arbil airport tarmac by Kurdistan Regional Government President Masoud Barzani and a delegation of high-ranking Kurdish officials, but little concrete progress was expected immediately.

Maliki's last official trip to Kurdistan was in 2010, when the "Arbil Agreement" was struck, allowing him to form a power-sharing government among majority Shi'ite Muslims, Sunnis and ethnic Kurds after months of wrangling.

That deal, like others after, was never fully implemented, and Baghdad's central government and the country's autonomous Kurdistan region have since been at odds over oil and disputed territories along their internal boundary.

"This will be an initial step on the track to finding solutions for all outstanding problems," Maliki said in a speech before a cabinet meeting in Arbil. Iraqi and Kurdish officials were due to hold further talks after that meeting.

Unless the current talks succeed, Iraqi Kurdish President Masoud Barzani said last week the self-ruled enclave would be forced to seek a "new form of relations" with Baghdad.