By John Lee.
The KRG's Minister for Natural Resources, Ashti Hawrami (pictured), has told Reuters that the Kurds have plans to increase their oil exports eight-fold by the end of 2015.
He said Kurdish oil exports could double "within a month or so" to around 250,000 bpd and hit 400,000 bpd by the end of 2014, reaching 1 million bpd by the end of next year.
This figure includes oil from Kirkuk, the area taken over by Kurdish "peshmerga" troops two weeks ago, but Hawrami insisted the Kurds would share the proceeds with Baghdad.
"We want to work with Baghdad under the constitution, and they will get their share of the oil they export from Kirkuk ...
"Resources and revenues must be shared. But pre-Mosul Iraq has gone and there is now a new reality ...
"We will not be dictated to by some people in Baghdad who want to centralize power, to bully and intimidate. We need a real federal system based on power sharing and revenue sharing."
In taking control of Kirkuk, the Kurds say they were filling a security vacuum after Iraqi troops fled from ISIS.
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