The Kirkuk-Ceyhan Transnational Oil Pipeline was sabotaged last month in Turkey, halting the export of the commodity from Iraq's self-governing Kurdish region and placing the Barzani-led Kurdish Regional Government under considerable strain, struggling to meet its public payroll.

War with Islamic State and an influx of people displaced by violence in the rest of Iraq have only added to Kurdistan's woes, which a decade of mismanagement and corruption put the region in a weak position to deal with.

Revenue has dropped in half to $303.9 million on oil sales of 10.15 million barrels in February, or 350,067 barrels a day, the Kurdistan Regional Government said in a monthly report on Monday. In January, revenue was $650 million on oil sales of 18.66 million barrels, or 601,811 barrels a day.

The attack comes at a time when the Kurdistan Regional Government in Erbil and the Iraqi Central Government in Baghdad have yet to reconcile their differences over the distribution of oil revenues though the central government. In June, the Kurds decided to export oil independently of the central government, generating at one time $800 million a month from oil sales. That amount has declined in part because of the drop in oil prices. Brent crude fell about 33 percent in the past year.