Although it did not get as much news coverage as the Turkey-Israel or Syrian files, Ankara’s tense relations with Baghdad were also among the key topics discussed during US Secretary of State John Kerry’s talks with Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu in Istanbul over the weekend.

Judging by what is filtering through the diplomatic grapevine, and what has being written about the topic recently, Washington is increasingly wary about developments in Iraq which suggest the country may be heading for a division that is bound to influence regional balances in favor of Iran.

Accusative remarks by Nechirvan Barzani, the prime minister of the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG), quoted by the Kurdish English-language daily Rudaw, to the effect that Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki is heading the country into a possible civil war do not help allay these concerns, of course.

Meanwhile, the Obama administration continues to express its disapproval of the growing cooperation between the KRG and Ankara, particularly in the strategic energy field, which the US fears is merely fueling those dynamics that are working for a division of Iraq along ethnic and sectarian lines.