Iraq's oil industry and its foreign investors see no cause to panic after Al-Qaeda militants seized major towns last week – troubled Anbar province, they note, could hardly be further from the main oil fields.
Iraq is looking to 2014 to show the biggest annual rise in oil exports since then, confirming its No. 2 position behind Saudi Arabia in OPEC as investments bear fruit.
International experts mostly view the government's official export target of 3.4 million barrels per day this year – an increase 1 million bpd on 2013 – as pure fiction.
If Baghdad gives a green light to Kurdish oil exports, these could run at 250,000 bpd. The oil fields of southern Iraq could pump an extra 500,000 bpd this year.
Although tightly guarded facilities near the Saudi and Kuwaiti borders in the south have been a safe haven for oil workers, 2013 was the deadliest year in Iraq since 2008, with nearly 9,000 people killed, and foreign executives are wary.
However, Iraq's long-term uncertainties mean international oil executives are not rushing to build up their investments.
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