Iraq’s refusal for railways to Gulf states to protect Iraqi ports, Minister says

BAGHDAD / IraqiNews.com: Iraq‘s Transport Minister said on Saturday that the reason why Iraq refused the project to link Iraq with the Gulf states through railways, has been taken to project Iraqi ports. He added that the border problem with Iran had hampered the clearing of sunken ships and materials in Shatt Al-Arab Waterway. “The reason behind Iraq‘s refusal of the railway link with the Gulf states is to protect Iraqi ports, because if the country is linked with the Gulf states and Iran by railways, the Iraqi ports shall die!,” Minister Amer Abdul-Jabbar told Saudi Middle East Newspaper. The Minister said that “the Arab Gulf states enjoy huge deepness, compares with Iraqi ports..So, if we agree on the railway linkage, all goods would be transported from the Arab Gulf states to all Iraqi provinces, through dry channels, hampering ships to reach Iraqi ports.” As regards to the problem with the Iranian side, the Minister said: “The main problem related to clear up the ships and other materials sunk in Shatt Al-Arab Waterway is the main issue facing the drawing of the borders with Iran,” adding that “there are problems with Iran regarding the drawing of borders, and there is a joint committee discussing the problem, that we hope would be able to settle the problem, to enable us clear the sunken ships and materials in the nearest possible time “It is too difficult to clear up those sunken ships and other materials from Shatt Al-Arab waters, due to the lack of our Ministry’s possession of gigantic lifting machines, with 2,000-ton capacity, able to lift those ships and materials,” he said, adding that “25 sunken sea materials had been lifted from the Shatt (Waterway) over the past two years, where Khor al-Zubeir Sea Canal was concentrated on, whilst Um-Qasr Port is large and demands us to lift the sunken materials that undermine sea transportation through it.” Southern Iraq‘s Basra port-city has five trade ports and two oil terminals, first is “Maaqal,” considered the mother terminal, established in 1916, when it had been used by the British occupation forces, and was handed over to the Iraqis in 1937, as well as the building of the “Faw” terminal the same year, expected to become a larger Iraqi terminal in the forthcoming years, along with the the construction of Umm-Qasr terminal in the early 1970s and Khor Al-Zubeir and Abu-Flous Terminal on Shatt Al-Arab bank, which was recently activated due to the increase of imports by the private sector. SKH/SR 1