MP: the government does not intend to activate the Chinese agreement

Shafaq News / The Iraqi Parliament’s Economy and Investment Committee confirmed on Tuesday that the United States of America is pushing towards abolishing the Chinese agreement while indicating that the government has no intention to activate it.

A member of the committee, Ali Saadoun, told Shafaq News agency, "The Parliamentary Committee of Economy and Investment called on the government more than once to activate the economic agreement with China but it did not respond to our request", indicating, "the agreement is very important for Iraq and will spur Chinese companies to invest and launch projects accordingly".

He added, "It was assumed that the agreement would enter into force after it was signed by the previous government. However, the government of Prime Minister Mustafa Al-Kadhimi does not have the intention to activate the agreement".

"foreign and American pressures are exerted to cancel the Chinese economic agreement and not activate it to serve personal interests", he continued.

Economic expert, Dergham Muhammad Ali, described the agreements that Iraq signed with American companies as "unsuccessful alternative" to the Chinese agreement.

On September 19, 2019, Iraq and China signed eight agreements and memoranda between their two delegations in Beijing, according to which Iraq opened a credit account in a Chinese bank, to deposit oil revenues of 100,000 barrels per day, in exchange for implementing infrastructure projects, such as schools, hospitals, roads, electricity, and sanitation is determined by the Ministry of Planning and in coordination with the government.