PM Al-Zaidi to meet lawmakers tonight on dollar rate

Shafaq News- Baghdad

Prime Minister Ali Al-Zaidi will meet parliament's leadership and the heads of political blocs at 8 p.m. on Thursday to discuss the new dollar exchange rate and its effects, an informed source told Shafaq News.

The finance minister and the Central Bank of Iraq (CBI) governor will also attend the meeting in the Constitutional Hall inside the parliament building, the source said.

Earlier on Thursday, the CBI governor told members of parliament's Finance Committee that the 1,500-dinar rate used as the basis for the budget was fixed and could not be changed, a parliamentary source told Shafaq News. Any change to the rate in the budget law would require revising all of the budget's tables and items, which were built on the 1,500-dinar rate, the governor explained, according to the source.

Neither the governor nor the finance minister went to parliament for that session; the governor conveyed the bank's position to the committee instead, the source added.

Read more: Iraqi parliament cancels session on dinar devaluation

The CBI introduced the new rates on Wednesday: 1,500 dinars per dollar for purchases from the Finance Ministry, 1,510 for sales to banks and 1,520 for sales to the public, up from the previous end-user rate of 1,320. Lawmakers have called for an emergency session to reconsider the decision.

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