ERBIL, Kurdistan Region — President Hassan Rouhani of the Islamic Republic of Iran will visit Baghdad on March 11 accompanied by a trade delegation as US sanctions have taken a toll on the Iranian economy.
This is the first visit for Rouhani to Iraq as president and it comes after several high profile visits by Iranian officials including the Foreign Minister Javad Zarif who mainly discussed trade.
Tasnim news agency reported on Thursday that the trip to Baghdad, which was announced during Zarif’s visit in January, has been confirmed for March 11.
Rouhani’s trip comes after President Barham Salih’s visit late last year when the Iraqi president called “for strong and friendly relations between the two countries.”
Since the withdrawal of the United States from the nuclear deal last year and the reimposition of crippling sanctions on vital Iranian sectors such as oil and gas, Iran has lost a great deal of trade and is increasingly looking to its immediate neighbours such as Iraq and its semi-autonomous northern region to bypass the sanctions.
Rouhani is facing an uphill struggle both at home and abroad to lessen the impact of the sanctions. The Kurdistan Region announced a ban of crude and petroleum product in mid-February which was revised later because of US pressure. Several American delegations have visited Erbil and Sulaymaniyah warning the Kurds to cut back on their trade ties with Iran, Rudaw understands from multiple business and official sources.
The reformist government in Tehran is under fire from hardliners in Iran who blame his government for trusting Washington and concluding the Nuclear Deal which they argue have brought no tangible benefits for Iran. Protests have broken out in Iran as a large number of companies are unable to pay the salaries of their employees as Iranian currency has lost 70 percent of its value since US withdrawal from the nuclear deal and the re-imposition of the sanction last year.
Iran has had cordial relations with Baghdad since the 2003 and the current trade between the two countries stand at around $12 billion. President Rouhani said in November during President Salih's visit, that he hoped to raise the number to $20 billion.
"Bilateral cooperation is in the interest of both nations and should be continued without foreign interference," Rouhani said at a joint press conference. Salih also described relations between the two nations as strategic and "rooted in history.”
In early November, the US government announced new sanctions targeting the shipping, financial and energy sectors but granted temporary allotments to countries like Iraq and Turkey. However, Prime Minister Adil Abdul-Mahdi has said that Iraq would not be part of the sanctions.
The Iraqi people have “suffered from embargo and realize the damage that peoples incur from its consequences,” Mahdi said earlier this month. “Iraq won’t be part of the sanctions system against Iran or any other people,” he said.
It is yet to be seen if the governments in Baghdad and Erbil will buckle under US pressure or back their western neighbor.
"I promise you that doing business with Iran in defiance of our sanctions will ultimately be a much more painful business decision than pulling out of Iran and it – being connected to Iran entirely," US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said during a press briefing on November 5, referring to any company doing business with the Islamic Republic.