Word: kurdistan
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...Such is life in Kurdistan, the last beacon of stability amid the wreckage of the U.S. enterprise in Iraq. But even there, stability is a relative term. True, the airport is putting in a runway long enough to accommodate jumbo jets, but for now it will be used mainly for U.S. military flights. That's because only one Western carrier-Austrian Airlines-is brave enough to land there. Other flights are run by off-brand charters with names such as Flying Carpet and Middle Eastern carriers such as Iraqi Airways. And even those are unreliable. Many of the officials...
...secular leadership committed to economic and political reform and sitting on a huge pool of oil. On the other hand, it is a tiny landlocked region, uncomfortably attached to a war-ravaged nation, and surrounded by unfriendly neighbors. Despite its outward signs of tranquility, the fate of Kurdistan-whether it will continue as an inspiring example of what the rest of Iraq could look like, or become engulfed by the country's violence-remains unresolved, dependent as much on what happens to the barely functioning Iraqi state as on the Kurds themselves...
...Some Sunni groups fear that their less oil-rich areas could lose out when Iraq's potentially huge wealth is distributed. The ability of regions to sign their own contracts was bitterly argued for months by negotiators from Kurdistan, where there is deep distrust of Baghdad's politicians. Under the law, companies can deal with both the central Ministry of Oil, as well as regional entities. But that concession has provoked intense anxiety that Iraq could break apart, if some regions - or perhaps even powerful Shi'ite clans in southern Iraq - calculate that they can finance autonomous states from their...
...pipelines and kill contractors - will be allowed to export their oil after paying the government a minimum 12.5% royalty, although there are usually also cash signing bonuses to the government, and most "profit oil," extracted after operating costs are met, would likely go to Baghdad. Regional governments - only Kurdistan has one right now - can sign their own contracts under the law, a dizzying change from decades when Saddam dictated the terms and stifled oil production in Kurdistan. A Baghdad-based Federal Council on Oil & Gas will be formed; it will have 60 days to appoint a team to arbitrate...
...amazed to find that U.S. officials and diplomats appeared to lie low, perhaps because they were overwhelmed by fighting the war. "The U.S. was so afraid to be seen to be meddling in Iraq's oil that they took a backseat," says Jonathan Morrow, legal adviser to the Kurdistan Regional Government and a former senior legal adviser to the U.S. Institute of Peace in Washington. Rather than simply satisfying oil companies, the new law "offers oil companies risk and reward" deals, which are necessary to attract the multibillion-dollar investments needed for companies to create new fields and extract large...