Saudi Arabia invites 100 Iraqi businessmen to visit

Saudi Arabia has invited 100 Iraqi businessmen, economic and banking professionals to visit Riyadh, a senior Saudi official said yesterday.

A newspaper reported the official in charge of the political, economic, cultural and media files in the Saudi embassy in Baghdad, Mishal Bin Mutib Al-Otaibi, saying that among those invited are the governor of Iraq’s Central Bank, the Chairman of the Financial Supervision Authority as well as the Minister of Youth and Sports, Abdul-Hussein Abtan, will visit Riyadh in the coming days to discuss common issues with Saudi officials.

Al-Otaibi stressed that bilateral relations are rapidly growing adding that 20 Iraqi universities will be invited to visit the Kingdom in the framework of cultural cooperation.

“There will also be research and academic cooperation between Iraqi universities and their Saudi counterparts,” Al-Otaibi said, noting that Iraqi officials have expressed interest in signing a memorandum of understanding between the Ministry of Higher Education in Iraq and the Ministry of Education in the Kingdom.

Saudi Arabia has recently crowned its rapprochement with Iraq with a joint economic and coordination council, the first of its kind in the history of relations between the two countries.

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