CBI signs key agreements with Turkish banks to facilitate trade: official

Shafaq News/ The Iraqi Central Bank (CBI) announced on Saturday that an Iraqi delegation has completed talks with a group of Turkish banks in Istanbul on facilitating trade between their respective countries.

The delegation, according to an official CBI statement, included representatives from the Iraqi government, the CBI, the Iraqi Private Banks Association, and several private banks.

The statement said the Iraqi and Turkish sides reached an agreement to establish "arrangements" between Iraqi and Turkish banks through "intermediary banks" in order to allow traders to make payments in euros or Turkish lira.

The two delegations also agreed on "pooled transfers" via an integrated cycle of the commercial process (depositing dinars in Iraq, paying in euros or lira in Turkey, shipping goods from Turkey to Iraq) to regulate transactions made by smaller traders and retailers.

The CBI said that those agreements are expected to facilitate transferring money into Turkey from Iraq for thousands of Iraqi traders and curtail illegal means.

The agreement, according to the statement, are a part of a broader plan by the CBI to open up channels and outlets for hard currencies in order to stabilize the financial system and control the exchange rate of the Iraqi dinar against the US dollar.