WASHINGTON, Oct. 5 (UPI) -- Iraq’s national security adviser says a deal is “very close” on a federal oil law -- one where “everybody goes home partly unhappy.”

Mowaffak al-Rubaie was largely optimistic Friday in a speech during a Washington visit, including on plans to protect and bolster the crucial energy sector.

The most prominent part of this has been a national oil law. It’s stalled in Parliament over concerns private and foreign companies will be allowed too much access to the currently nationalized oil sector and a larger debate over how much control the federal, regional and provincial powers will have.

“I wouldn’t like to say the hydrocarbons law only needs to cross the t’s and dot the i’s,” Rubaie said at the Center for Strategic & International Studies, a Washington think tank. “We’ve been saying this for long. But I’ll tell you what: There is a huge pressure from everywhere, inside and outside the country.”

The U.S. government has pushed the Iraqi government on passing the controversial law both publicly and behind closed doors. It is billed as a way toward reconciliation, since sales from the world’s third-largest reserves last year brought in 93 percent of the federal budget.