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WASHINGTON DC - Kurdish officials are in Washington to ensure that the autonomous Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) receives its share of an estimated $15 billion worth of financial assistance that the International Monetary Fund (IMF) is expected to approve for Iraq.The KRG’s deputy prime minister, Qubad Talabani, said in Washington that he had received “positive responses” from IMF officials about requests to ensure that Erbil is not left out of the agreement."There is a standby agreement that has been drawn up for Iraq and that is hopefully going to be a sizable sum that is going to be given to Iraq,” Talabani said.“We are also here to talk to our friends at the IMF to ensure that, out of any funds that go to Iraq, our portion in Kurdistan is weighed out,” he added. “We received positive responses” from the officials, he added.The head of the IMF's mission in Iraq, Christian Josz, said last month that his organization could approve a standby arrangement by early June, which would provide Iraq with $15 billion worth of international assistance over the course of the next three years.This, an IMF statement assessed, is primarily due to "the conflict (against Islamic State), destruction of infrastructure and assets, disruption in trade, and deterioration of investor confidence."The KRG desperately needs the funds to climb out of a severe financial crisis. The crunch has been brought on by Baghdad’s refusal to make regular payments out of the national budget for salaries for civil servants and the Peshmerga forces, drooping oil prices and the burden of caring for nearly 2 million refugees and internally displaced persons.