Limit on foreign workers coming to KRI harms Iranian Kurds
ERBIL, Kurdistan Region – New limits imposed on the number of foreign workers allowed to enter the Kurdistan Region, and a review of firms tasked with importing foreign labor, is hitting workers from Iranian Kurdistan especially hard.
The KRG Labor and Social Affairs Ministry recently placed restrictions on the flow of foreign workers coming to the Kurdistan Region of Iraq.
There are currently around 100 companies importing foreign workers into the Region.
According the ministry’s new regulations, these companies must bring workers based on their suitability for the job or sector they are entering.
“Whenever our inspection teams check places [where there are foreign workers] and find out that they do not carry work licenses and have no insurance, either the employer will be tried or asked to resolve the issue,” Arif Hito, an official from the Labor and Social Affairs Ministry, told Rudaw.
“It is the ministry’s duty to impose these though restrictions.”
One group of workers who rarely come to the Region with a recruitment agency or insurance is Iranian Kurds. The regulations will hit them particularly hard.
“Iraq’s currency is valuable, while Iran’s currency not. It is good for us to work here,” Qudrat Musa, a Kurdish worker from Iran working in the Region, told Rudaw.
“Sometimes we make 15,000 and sometimes 20,000 which is good. If we are prevented from working here, then we are forced to go back to Iran where there is no work.”
The KRG has so far facilitated visa free travel for Kurds from Iran, Turkey, and Syria to come to the Region and stay for one month.
“If they tell us go back home, what should we do, what will happen to us there?” asked Mihran Hassan, another worker. Their families at home in Iran will be disappointed by the KRG decision, he added.
The number of foreign workers in the Kurdistan Region reached 60,000 by the end of 2017. This fell to 40,000 a year later.
Now that the economy is recovering, more foreign workers are expected to arrive, prompting the new controls.