PM's Oil Minister Nominee Withdraws Candidacy

By John Lee.

The Prime Minister's nominee for the post of oil minister in his new 'technocrat cabinet' has reportedly withdrawn his candidacy, apparently because he had not been formally proposed by the main Kurdish groups.

Nizar Saleem Numan, a 65-year-old Kurdish petroleum geologist, who is the dean of the college of planning at the University of Duhok, told reporters "because there is no political agreement over the form of the future government, I withdraw my candidacy for the ministry of oil position."

It had been widely hoped that his nomination would help to resolve the ongoing dispute between Baghdad and Erbil regarding the export of oil from the Kurdistan region.

(Sources: AP, Reuters)