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Iraq economy: Trade booming between Iraq and Iran despite US sanctions, Kurdish industry up after internal Iraq customs duties removed
 US pressure on Iraq, Kurdistan no impact on trade with Tehran: Iranian official [Rudaw] Trade is booming between Iran and Iraq including the Kurdistan Region despite increasing US pressure, a senior Iranian official based in Iraq claimed on the day Washington upped the ante by officially designating the powerful Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) as a Foreign Terrorist Organization (FTO) like al-Qaeda and the Islamic State ...formerly ISIS or ISIL, depending on your preference. Before that al-Qaeda in Iraq, as shaped by Abu Musab Zarqawi. They're very devout, committing every atrocity they can find in the Koran and inventing a few more. They fling Allaharound with every other sentence, but to hear the pols talk they're not reallyMoslems.... (ISIS). "Despite repeated trips by American officials as well as economic and political delegations to Iraq and the Kurdistan Region in order to convince the Iraqi traders to abide by the American sanctions against Iran, there has been no sign that the Iraqi side has accepted these requests," Iran’s Consul General to Sulaimani Saadullah Masudian told an Iranian outlet on Monday. Customs-free trade with Iraq gets Kurdish industry pumping [Rudaw] Factory output in the Kurdistan Region is booming thanks to the removal of customs duties and checkpoints between Iraq and the Region. "Due to the removal of customs checkpoints between Baghdad and the Region and the unification of customs duties, the export of our factories' products to the Iraqi cities has increased by 20 percent," Mustafa Zubair, who oversees factory affairs for the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) Ministry of Trade and Industry, told Rudaw, without specifying a time period. "High quality and cheap prices" have contributed to increased demand on Kurdish-made goods and services, according to Zubair. Some 70 percent of products produced by factories in the Kurdistan Region are sold elsewhere in Iraq. Following the takeover of Kirkuk by Iraqi forces supported by Iran-backed Shiite Hashd al-Shaabi paramilitias, the Iraqi government decreed to deal with Kurdish-made products as foreign exports. High customs fees were levied on the pretext that the KRG does not abide by Iraq's Law No. 25, 1991 for Industrial Development concerning the licensing of factories. This move forced the plants in the Kurdistan Region to revoke their licence with the KRG and apply for a new one from Baghdad to escape high tariffs. "This problem has now been resolved," Zubair claimed. Permits are now being issued according to Iraq's Law No. 20, 1998. "Any factory licensed based on that law will be exempted from any taxes and customs fees for 10 years allowing them to import raw material to their factories from any border-crossings of Iraq," he explained. The majority of the Region’s factories are located in Erbil − around 1,200. "The removal of customs points between the Iraqi cities and the Kurdistan Region has led to an increase in demand on Kurdish factory outputs from the Iraqi cities and a boost for businesses. Therefore a number of factories that had been shut down in the past have once again resumed their operations," said Taeb Kazho, head of Erbil’s industrial development. Posted by: trailing wife 2019-04-17 |
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