Iraq's inability to borrow money has 'plunged it into crisis'

A parliamentary session at the Parliament Building in Baghdad, Iraq on 3 September 2018 [Haydar Karaalp/Anadolu Agency]

A member at the Iraqi parliament’s finance committee yesterday said that the country’s federal budget would be released “soon”.

Jamal Cougar told reporters that the draft federal budget law by the Iraqi cabinet would arrive to the parliament “on Wednesday”, adding that it would be studied by the lawmakers “on Saturday”.

“The Iraqi government has obtained 15 trillion Iraqi dinars ($12.6 billion) from internal borrowing institutions, but it was unable to obtain $5 billion from external borrowers,” he pointed out.

He warned that the government’s failure to borrow from international funders had “plunged Iraq into crisis”.

In recent weeks, the Iraqi the government rejected the borrowing terms of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank.

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