OPEC quota and market economics reasons Iraq may tell foreign oil firms to reduce production below contracted plateau.
Iraq's Kurds still pegged for kingmaker status but demands for oil autonomy will be weakened by internal competition and challenges from resurgent Sunni voters.
Leaders in Kirkuk, Iraq's second largest oil producing province, cautiously optimistic about plan to increase redistribution of wealth to locals.
In the infancy of Iraq's next government, voters appeared to have picked current prime minister Maliki and former premier Allawi.
Election Day at a polling center in the heart of Baghdad's dangerous Sunni neighborhood of Adhamiya reveals telling currents.
Any of these candidates for the oil portfolio in the next government have a massive task in reconstruction and expansion that will make or break the country.
The issues that have divided Baghdad and the Kurdish region of Iraq will be awaiting the new government after March 7 national elections.
A top oil ministry technocrat who survived deBaathification (twice) and defended Baghdad's Daura refinery against insurgents is running a long-shot bid for Iraq's vicious parliament.
Nine-judge high court takes further arguments from attorneys and gives four weeks to receive rebuttals on potential oil industry-shaking lawsuit.
A stunning and revealing examination of oil's indelible impact on the countries that produce it and the people who possess it.
