Iraq plans pipeline revamp for direct Kirkuk oil exports to Turkey, minister says

BAHGHDAD, March 16 (Reuters) - Iraq is working to revamp a disused pipeline that would allow oil to be pumped directly to Turkey's Ceyhan port without passing through the Kurdistan region, Iraqi oil minister Hayan Abdel-Ghani said in a video statement released on Monday.

Iraq will complete inspection of a 100-km (62-mile) section of the pipeline "within a week from now" to enable direct exports from Kirkuk, he added.

The reopening of the Kirkuk-Ceyhan pipeline, which has been shut for more than a decade, would provide an alternative route to a pipeline from the Kurdistan region.

Exports via the 960 km pipeline, which once handled about 0.5% of global supply, were halted in 2014 after repeated attacks by Islamic State militants.

The oil ministry had previously asked the Kurdistan Regional Government to allow it to use the Kurdistan pipeline as an alternative route for crude flows disrupted by the Iran conflict. But it later said the KRG had set arbitrary conditions for the pipeline's use.

Responding on Sunday, Iraq's Kurdish authorities rejected the accusation they were refusing to allow crude exports through the pipeline and said Baghdad had failed to address security and economic challenges facing the region's oil sector.