Syrian Oil Becomes Fault Line In War
With Syria's oil reserves divided between Kurdish and opposition forces, some fear a clash over the country's energy resources.
MALEKIYYAH, Al-HASSAKAH PROVINCE, Syria — The province of Hassakah is the Syrian oil tank. Before the revolution, its 170,000 barrels per day accounted for more than half of the country's oil production, thus representing the backbone of those oil exports covering a third of national export revenues. Syrian oil engineers working in the province told Al-Monitor that the Democratic Union Party (PYD) — affiliated with the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) — currently controls around 60% of the oil fields, leaving the remaining 40% in the hands of several factions of the Arab opposition. Since the conflict engulfed the route of the pipelines to the refineries, however, the drills have stopped working.
Despite such a fragmented context, the European Union on April 22 decided to lift the oil embargo on liberated regions in Syria in an attempt to support the opposition. The move, though, is likely to stir up Kurdish-Arab strife and catalyze regime raids on a region that has largely remained immune to the conflict so far. The war for control of Syria’s energy resources has not even started, but mutual allegations are already circulating between the parties involved, which accuse each other of cutting power supplies and dealing with the regime.
Exporting crude oil to Europe would encourage ethnic strife, but Syria’s rebel-held areas urgently need to produce or import fuel, electricity and gas to meet the basic needs of the population under its control, unless the undesirable option of trading with the regime is brought back to the table. For the time being, the few energy resources available remain prey to looting and black-market dealing.
In Hassakah, the response to the European call for oil trade with the Arab opposition's Syrian National Coalition (SNC) has been largely negative. The PYD doesn't recognize any SNC power over its territories and sees the proposal as an attempt to encourage Arab offensives against Kurdish-held areas. The Free Syrian Army (FSA) compares it to plundering as long as there is no transitional government on the ground.
