Jordan Times
Sunday, January 24, 1999
Jordanian-Iraqi joint committee to meet in Baghdad this week
AMMAN (J.T.) — The Jordanian-Iraqi joint committee will hold a meeting in Baghdad in the coming week to discuss economic relations and bilateral trade, according to Minister of Industry, Trade and Supply Mohammad Saleh Hourani Saturday.
Hourani told the Jordan News Agency (Petra) that he expects the volume of trade between the two countries to be less than that of l998 largely due to the decline in the price of crude oil over the past few months.
The decline in the price of oil will naturally have a great effect on the volume of goods exported to Iraq, especially as Jordan adheres to the U.N.-Iraq oil-for-food deal, the minister pointed out.
Earlier this month Jordan and Iraq signed an oil agreement under which Baghdad will supply Jordan with 4.8 million tonnes of crude oil and by-products in 1999.
The Iraqi Ministry of Oil Under Secretary Ahmad Basheer was quoted as saying that, under the agreement, Iraq will supply Jordan with oil at concessionary rates in return for Jordanian food and medicine. In previous years, when oil prices were higher, Iraq got in return around $300-350 million worth of food and medicine from Jordanian firms.
Food and medical imports — if approval is granted by the U.N. Sanctions Committee on Iraq — are not covered by the sweeping U.N. sanctions imposed on Iraq after its 1990 invasion of Kuwait.
Hourani told Petra that Jordan is keen to maintain its trade and economic links with Iraq, noting that next week's joint committee meeting will be preceded by a meeting of a joint technical committee.
Minister of Energy and Mineral Resources Hani Mulki was scheduled to go to Baghdad to renew an annual trade deal between the two countries but had to delay his trip due to a shortage of gas in Jordan.
Mulki was also earlier forced to postpone his visit to Iraq due to the American air strikes late last month. But Hourani did not say who will lead the Jordanian side to the Baghdad meetings. He only said that the joint committee meeting in Baghdad next week will involve Cabinet members whose ministries are concerned with the trade exchange deal.