Kurdistan imports medical supplies from Turkey, as Iraqi security situation worsens

The government of Kurdistan has started to import medical supplies from Turkey as it has been unable to ship them from Baghdad due to the deteriorating security situation and the stopping of cargo flights between Baghdad and Erbil, the Minister of Health of the Kurdistan Regional Government, Dr Rekawt Hama Rasheed said.

Speaking during a press conference in the Sulaymaniyah governorate, Rasheed pointed that until recently the region’s provinces received their share of medical supplies from the Federal Ministry of Health in Baghdad. However, Rasheed noted, the supplies stopped because of the deteriorating security situation and the stopping of cargo flights from Baghdad to the region’s airports.

He said: “the Kurdistan Regional Government currently imports medical supplies from Turkey in order to meet the needs of the provinces’ hospitals.”

The north and west of Iraq have seen widespread unrest in recent months after the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIS) took control of parts of the country including Mosul, Iraq’s northern capital.