As fighting rocks northern Iraq’s oil-rich Kirkuk area, and air strikes attempt to take out Islamic State positions, the dust will likely either settle in favor of the Iraqi Kurds, who have played a key role in protecting this area from the ISIS advance and who could use Kirkuk to cement their independence ambitions, or in favor of Baghdad, which knows that the loss of Kirkuk means the loss of northern Iraq. Last weekend, military operations targeting ISIS in northern Iraq took out some 60 Islamic State fighters, according to Iraqi security forces, both in the provinces of Nineveh and Kirkuk—both oil venues. Some 30 militants were reportedly killed in air strikes near Nineveh’s Qayyarah oil field. Related: Why Oil Prices Will Rise And Many Pundits Will Be Caught By Surprise While ISIS has terrorized northern Iraq—a swathe of territory that lies between that controlled by the Kurdistan Regional […]