United Leadership, which is carrying the first cargo of Kurdish crude loaded out of the Turkish port of Ceyhan, was outside of the Moroccan port of Mohammedia on Monday, according to Platts cFlow vessel tracking software.

The vessel, which is carrying more than 1 million barrels of crude, is currently stationary outside of the port, which is the delivery point for the 200,000 b/d Mohammedia refinery, owned by Samir.

A representative for Samir could not be immediately reached for comment.

"The United Leadership arrived in Mohammedia today at 11:00 am [1000 GMT] and is to be received by Moroccan refiner Samir," a port agent said.

As of last week, the cargo appeared to be headed towards the US Gulf Coast, but it turned sharply southeast over the weekend towards Morocco.

United Leadership was loaded at Ceyhan a week and a half ago with stored Kurdish barrels at the Botas terminal. The Kurdish Regional Government has been sending between 100,000 and 120,000 b/d of oil -- reportedly a mix of the Taq Taq and Tawke fields -- through the smaller of the two parallel lines that make up the Kirkuk-Ceyhan export pipeline.

A dispute between Baghdad and Erbil over independent Kurdish oil exports has snowballed as a result of the successful export out of Ceyhan, though smaller parcels of 40,000 mt each have been flowing out of the smaller Turkish ports of Dortyol and Mersin since December last year.

Baghdad has repeatedly threatened to take legal action against any entity that buys Kurdish volumes not sold through Iraq's official market agency SOMO.

Iraq filed a request for arbitration with the International Chamber of Commerce against Turkey over the exports shortly after United Leadership left Ceyhan.