London - Brussels: Europe and the Arabs
The Iraqi and British prime ministers said in a joint statement that their countries have agreed on a trade package worth 12.3 billion pounds (equivalent to 14.98 billion dollars), in addition to a bilateral defense agreement.
The deal, which stipulates doubling the volume of trade between them to ten times their total trade in 2024, was announced after a meeting between Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani and his British counterpart Keir Starmer in London. According to what was published by the Euronews news website in Brussels yesterday evening,
The package includes a project worth 1.2 billion pounds, through which British-made energy transmission systems will be used in the electricity interconnection project between Iraq and Saudi Arabia. The agreement also includes a plan worth 500 million pounds to develop the Qayyarah Air Base in northern Iraq.
The statement said that part of the deal is the water infrastructure project that will be led by the United Kingdom. It will contribute to providing clean water in the arid regions of southern and western Iraq. The project will be worth up to 5.3 billion pounds in British exports.
Al-Sudani and Starmer also signed a defence agreement that “establishes a new era in security cooperation”. Al-Sudani previously said the UK-Iraq security agreement would develop bilateral military relations, after the US-led coalition fighting the Islamic State group announced last year that it would end its work in Iraq in 2026. The Iraqi prime minister began an official visit to the UK on Monday amid historic geopolitical shifts in the Middle East, as Iraq tries to avoid becoming a conflict zone again.