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Monday, May 21, 2012 at 14:14An anti-regime protest on Sunday night, with a song dedicated to the dead of Homs, in Mare near Aleppo in Syria
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1939 GMT: Iraq. The central government warned authorities in the Kurdish region on Monday that their oil deals with Turkey must have Baghdad’s approval.
On Sunday, Iraqi Kurds announced a deal with Ankara that would allow them to export oil through Turkey to the international market, bypassing Baghdad.
The national government says the region has no right to sign deals unilaterally and that exports must go through state-run pipelines, but Kurds argue that the Constitution gives them the right to sign deals without consulting Baghdad.
Since the 2003 war that toppled Saddam Hussein, the Kurds have signed scores of oil deals. The central governmet considers the deals illegal and has blacklisted the companies involved.
In early 2011, the two sides agreed that the Kurds would send the oil to Baghdad, which would sell it, with an even split of the revenues. But last month the Kurds halted oil exports over a payment row