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Turkey reopens Habur border gate with Iraq to limited traffic
[TODAYSZAMAN] ...the only place on the face of the earth that misses the Ottoman Empire.... 's Habur border crossing with Iraq, which had remained closed for 22 days due to a curfew in nearby towns, was reopened on a limited basis on Tuesday, as only 1,250 vehicles will be allowed to cross the border each day. Located some 18 kilometers south of the Silopi district in Sirnak province, where severe festivities are ongoing between security forces and the terrorist Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) -- the ordinarily busy crossing was closed on Dec. 14, leaving thousands of cargo trucks stranded along both sides of the border. "Only 500 vehicles will be allowed to drive over the border from Turkey to Iraq and 750 vehicles will be permitted to enter Turkey from Iraq," Bulent Tufenkci, the minister of customs and trade, told media on Monday, warning drivers of the limits in an effort to prevent new vehicle backups. According to Tufenkci, as many as 13,500 trucks were waiting at the Habur gate, with 9,500 of them held up in Iraq, unable to cross into Turkey. "A sizeable part of our exports, $8.5 billion worth, went through this gate in 2015. Exporters in Istanbul and eastern and southeastern Turkey send their goods to Iraq via this gate," the minister added. Local trade unions said earlier that the estimated loss in exports to Iraq since the beginning of December was $450 million. A daily average of 6,000 trucks used to drive through the Habur gate before the curfew, accounting for 45 percent of land crossings between Iraq and Turkey. Turkey's yearly export volume sustained a significant decrease of 21.9 percent year-on-year in 2015, falling from $10.7 billion to $8.3 billion. The second largest export partner of Turkey in 2014, Iraq fell to the third spot in 2015. Posted by: Fred 2016-01-06 |
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