Allawi: oil volatility exacerbated Iraq's "chronic" crises

Shafaq News/ The volatility of the oil market exacerbated the "chronic and costly" crises of the Iraqi community, Finance Minister Ali Abdul-Amir Allawi told a panel at the annual Doha forum.

Allawi said, "recovering from the reverberations of the Coronavirus pandemic is not worrisome anymore, the abundance and expansion of armed conflicts hotbeds is."

"Undoubtedly, security, stability, and resolving the differences between the Arab states and their regional and international surrounding contributes to the world's recovery, peace, and prosperity," he said, "hopefully, the geographic and historic factors would promote the incentive of dialogue, as an objective and moral alternative to conflict."

"The Iraqi community suffers from deep and costly crisis profounded by the fluctuations of oil prices in the international market," the Minister continued, "diminished oil revenues and terrorism were a major concern at the governmental, political, and public levels. Amid the historic deterioration of the international economy, the national financial strategy had to act. In the short term, borrowing addressed the urgent needs; The long term is represented by the white paper for financial and economic reform."

Allawi said that the white paper allows "rebalancing the Iraqi economy and places it on the track that allows the state to develop a diverse and dynamic economy."