Iraq, Jordan Reopen Border Crossing

Iraqi flags fly at the Iraqi Trebil border crossing on the Iraq-Jordan border on August 30, 2017. (AP)
Iraqi flags fly at the Iraqi Trebil border crossing on the Iraq-Jordan border on August 30, 2017. (AP)
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Iraq, Jordan Reopen Border Crossing

Iraqi flags fly at the Iraqi Trebil border crossing on the Iraq-Jordan border on August 30, 2017. (AP)
Iraqi flags fly at the Iraqi Trebil border crossing on the Iraq-Jordan border on August 30, 2017. (AP)

Iraq and Jordan have inaugurated a joint industrial area on the border between the neighboring countries.

The ceremony on the Iraq-Jordan border was attended by Iraqi Prime Minister Adel Abdul-Mahdi and his Jordanian counterpart Omar Razzaz.

Saturday's meeting was also attended by top officials as the former neighbors boost their relations following the defeat of the ISIS terrorist group that controlled areas in Iraq bordering Jordan.

The border crossing was formally reopened Saturday.

As part of the agreement between the two countries that was signed in late December, Iraq will supply Jordan with oil a day at a lower price.

Under the deal, Iraq would sell 10,000 barrels per day of oil to Jordan at a special price, transported by tanker from its Kirkuk oilfields, the Jordanian prime minister’s office said in a statement. It did not say what the price was or when the oil would be exported.

Iraqi goods imported via Jordan’s Aqaba port on the Red Sea would meanwhile receive preferential tariffs, it said.

Aqaba port at the north end of the Red Sea has long been a major transit route for Iraqi imports and exports, and Amman has long relied on Iraqi crude to fuel its economy.

Razzaz’s office also said Jordan would begin to export electricity to Iraq within the next two years.

Abdul Mahdi says the government aims to decrease dependency on oil exports for state revenue. Oil exports from OPEC’s second-largest producer account for more than 95 percent of state revenues.

Furthermore, Abdul-Mahdi's office said Iraqi officials were handed 1,300 pieces of antiquities that Jordanian authorities confiscated from smugglers.



Iraq Says Kurdish Separatist Group in Türkiye Attacked Iraqi Border Guards, Killing 2

A member of the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) carries an automatic rifle on a road in the Qandil mountains in northern Iraq. (AFP)
A member of the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) carries an automatic rifle on a road in the Qandil mountains in northern Iraq. (AFP)
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Iraq Says Kurdish Separatist Group in Türkiye Attacked Iraqi Border Guards, Killing 2

A member of the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) carries an automatic rifle on a road in the Qandil mountains in northern Iraq. (AFP)
A member of the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) carries an automatic rifle on a road in the Qandil mountains in northern Iraq. (AFP)

Iraq’s Interior Ministry said Friday in a statement that two members of the Iraqi border guards were killed and another wounded in an attack that it said was carried out by the Kurdistan Workers’ Party, or PKK, in the area of Zakho, in northwestern Iraq near the borders with Türkiye and Syria.

Iraq last year officially banned the PKK, a Kurdish separatist group that has waged an insurgency against Türkiye since the 1980s and is considered by Ankara to be a terrorist group.

A security official who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to comment said the PKK has previously targeted military points of the Kurdish Peshmerga forces and the Iraqi border guards.

Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan is set to visit Baghdad on Sunday, where he is expected to discuss regional security issues and Turkish military operations against the PKK and affiliated groups.

The US-backed, Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces, which have controlled northeast Syria for the past decade, is under attack by the Syrian National Army, an umbrella organization of Turkish-backed armed groups, which regards the SDF as an extension of the PKK.