“We reached an agreement with Qatar to provide us with quantities of gas in winter … it could start within months,” Adil Karim, Iraq’s acting electricity minister said during an interview with Iraqia News.
The imports will be delivered to the country through Qatar’s ports.
Iraq and Qatar discussed gas supplies to the former to address its power shortages in February.
It relies heavily on Iranian natural gas for power. Over the past year, Iran has cut gas exports to Iraq repeatedly over unpaid debts, leading to blackouts across the border.
However, Tehran has agreed to resume gas supplies to Baghdad in April following a deal between the two.
“It has been agreed with Iran to supply Iraq with 50 million cubic meters of gas per day,” Karim said, adding that Baghdad needs Tehran’s gas for the next “five to 10 years.”
Iraq is in arrears to Iran, owing it 1.69 billion dollars. Iran is responsible for a minimum of 30 percent of Iraq’s energy, according to Karim.
Electricity shortages in Iraq are also caused by multiple factors, including poor basic services, the government’s inability to deliver these services, rampant corruption, and terror attacks on the power grid.
The Iraqi ministry has been working on increasing electricity supplies to the country for a while.
It has finished its technical supplies to import electricity from Turkey, and reached an agreement with Jordan to import 150 megawatts of power later this year.
Source (Click Here)