The financial advisor to the Iraqi Prime Minister, Mazhar Muhammad Salih, revealed that Iraq's internal and external debts have reached 113 billion dollars, including 40 billion dollars outstanding debts since the 1980s and 1990s.
He explained that "there are foreign debts on Iraq that have accumulated due to the war on" ISIS ", and debts due to development projects provided by some global funds totaling $ 23 billion, payable." Adding that "the Iraqi government has internal debts of 50 billion dollars, in addition to outstanding debts of 8 countries, including Iran, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, the Emirates and Kuwait, amounting to 40 billion dollars, and these countries do not want to write off their debts, even though they are subject to the Paris Club."
Iraq is experiencing a suffocating financial crisis, as a result of the decline in oil prices due to the Corona pandemic crisis, which paralyzed large sectors of the world’s economies.
The Minister of Finance, Ali Allawi, revealed that the size of the public debt owed by his country had reached 133.3 billion dollars, according to the previous exchange rate of 1183 dinars to the dollar, compared to 1450 now.
Iraq is the second largest producer of crude oil in OPEC, with an average daily production of 4.6 million barrels in normal conditions, far from the current production cut agreement by the OPEC + alliance.
Source (Al-Araby Al-Jadeed Newspaper, Edited)
