Armed groups allied to the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham, known as ISIS or ISIL, have attacked a number of oil facilities across the north of Iraq since Monday, including the 320,000 b/d Baiji refinery and Bai Hassan oil field.
ISIS took over the major city of Mosul in a two-day offensive ending Tuesday, followed by a push further into the Salahaddin, Kirkuk and Diyala provinces. But Kurdish peshmerga fighters said they have moved to halt the militants advance.
“We tightened our control of Kirkuk city and are awaiting orders to move toward the areas that are controlled by ISIL,” Brigadier General Shirko Rauf of the Kurdish peshmerga security forces told AFP.
The defensive moves means the militants are less likely to move further east to threaten oil fields being developed inside the semi-autonomous Kurdistan by foreign players. Investors watched closely developments to gauge the impact of the fighting on oil companies with material asset exposure in Kurdistan.
The UK’s Gulf Keystone Petroleum, which is developing the large Shaikan oil field south of the Tawke field in Kurdistan, stemmed further steep share price losses in London Thursday after dropping almost 9% in value on Wednesday. Afren, which is exploring two oil block on the Kurdish border with Iraq, dipped 1.7% in London after taking losses of 5% on Wednesday.


