The Daily Digest
Iraq and the United States signed an agreement on Thursday to transfer the US Embassy’s diplomatic-support centre at Baghdad airport to Iraqi control. The Foreign Ministry said Iraqi undersecretary Mohammed Hussein Bahr al-Uloom and US acting chargé d’affaires Steven Fagin signed it in Baghdad. The ministry placed the agreement among preparations to end the coalition mission on 30 September. Bahr al-Uloom described it as a step toward wider economic, development and energy cooperation with Washington. The National described the site’s transfer as forthcoming: the agreement is signed, but a completed handover is not established.
Separately, three Iraqi airports suspended Iranian flights starting Friday, Reuters reported, citing sources and state media. Iraq had earlier been reported to have suspended Iranian flights to Baghdad. Before Friday, ground handlers had stopped serving Iranian flights over sanctions concerns, while Iran’s civil aviation authority said Baghdad-bound services would be redirected to Najaf. US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent had warned that companies providing Iranian airlines with fuel, landing services or ticket sales could face exclusion from the dollar system. Earlier statements said Najaf, Erbil and Sulaymaniyah had received no formal suspension notice.
Iraqi officials involved in the talks told The New Region that Prime Minister Ali al-Zaidi presented US officials in New York with a phased plan and a longer timetable for bringing faction weapons under state control. Elmanshar.com separately reported a private meeting between al-Zaidi and President Donald Trump, but did not establish that they discussed the reported 30 June 2027 weapons target. US Secretary of State Marco Rubio warned that armed forces outside state institutions risked fragmenting Iraq, according to Shafaq News. Badr’s parliamentary bloc renewed its support for government control of weapons without announcing a handover. Security adviser Qasim al-Araji had said the weapons committee had no fixed completion deadline, and no faction has confirmed a handover. Responding to what it called a US siege, Kataib Hezbollah urged Iraqis to buy Iranian products and expand trade with Iran; its appeal did not announce an organized campaign already under way.
Iraq’s state oil marketer SOMO offered late-September crude cargoes to at least two buyers, Bloomberg reported, citing people with direct knowledge, as record freight costs complicated purchases. The report said the extra oil available for purchase suggested some traders had backed out. SOMO also tendered two million barrels of Basrah Heavy for loading between 1 and 7 October. Bids are due at noon Baghdad time on 28 September. An earlier tender covered another two million barrels for loading from 27 to 30 September through a ship-to-ship transfer off Oman, outside the Strait of Hormuz. The late-September offers put an immediate search for buyers alongside SOMO’s new October sale.
An Iraqi oil source said the first imported gasoline batch reached Syria’s Baniyas port, where loading for truck transport to Iraq had begun. The source did not give the quantity, supplier or route into Iraq. Oil Minister Basim Mohammed Khudair had put the shortfall at at least five million litres of imported petrol a day, and parliament subsequently called for an urgent supply plan. Long queues and filling-station closures have accompanied the shortage. An Iraqi parliamentary committee meanwhile proposed bringing Kurdistan Region fuel supplies under federal distribution and pricing. If supplies prove insufficient, its proposal would divide available quantities equally among provinces and end the Region’s separate 50,000-barrel daily crude allocation. The gasoline batch is at the Syrian port, not yet at Iraqi filling stations.
Kurdistan Regional Government Deputy Planning Minister Sirwan Mohammed accused federal authorities of changing census figures to reduce the Region’s population share to 12.67 percent. He said the table excluded displaced people, refugees and foreign residents living in the Region and assigned displaced people to other provinces. The KRG insists on a 14.14 percent share for the 2027 federal budget; its cabinet had said Iraq’s Higher Population Council set the figure at 12.68 percent. The dispute comes alongside Erbil’s request for another 450 billion dinars for Peshmerga pay. A senior Peshmerga Ministry source said the force received its final installment of coalition financial support on Thursday, with the four-year support memorandum expiring Friday. Erbil is pressing its federal budget demands as that source says coalition financial support is ending.