Iraq should boost southern crude exports this month even after an armed insurgency disrupted the nation’s northern oil operations, according to the International Energy Agency. Shipments from Iraq’s southern region should recover this month to about 2.6 million barrels a day, compared with 2.42 million in June, barring technical problems, the Paris-based IEA said today. The increase will come from oil in storage tanks at Fao and added capacity from the West Qurna 2 and Majnoon fields. Production from the northern Kurdistan region surged last month even as the conflict escalated, the IEA said. “Iraq’s southern oil fields have so far remained untouched by the violence sweeping through the north and west,” the IEA said in its monthly oil market report. “The risk remains that militants will target the region’s vital infrastructure and cause a substantial or lengthy disruption.” Iraqi crude production fell to 3.17 million barrels a day […]