Kurdistan Ministry of Finance sends June payroll to Iraqi Government for funding

Shafaq News/ The Ministry of Finance and Economy in the Kurdistan Region announced on Saturday that it has submitted the payroll schedule for public sector employees for June to the Federal Ministry of Finance for funding.

The ministry stated in a release that it completed the necessary procedures to secure the salaries of all civilian and military employees, as well as retirees.

Thanks to oil exports, the Kurdistan Region previously had independent funding that partly covered salaries. However, a dispute involving the federal government and Turkiye, through which the oil had been exported, has blocked that source of income for the regional administration since March 2023.

Iraqi Kurdistan and Baghdad later agreed in principle that sales of Kurdish oil would pass through the federal government. In exchange, 12.6 percent of Iraq's public spending will go to the autonomous region.

The court, in its ruling, also ordered the Kurdish administration to hand over "all its oil and non-oil revenues" to the federal government and mandated an audit of relevant accounts.

With oil revenues gone, Kurdistan's current main source of revenue is taxes collected at border crossings with neighboring countries, including Iran and Turkiye, two of Iraq's main regional trade partners.