The parliament is optimistic: Crossings can cover quarter the budget

Shafaq News / The Parliamentary Economy and Investment Committee said, on Friday, that the financial revenues of the border outlets will amount up to quarter the country's annual budget if the state establishes full control over the borders.

A member of the committee, MP Nada Shaker Jawdat, told Shafaq News agency, "The security forces came to the borders by an order of the Prime Minister to control the Iraqi border crossings and ports", noting, "the council of Representatives is supervising the government's measures to control the outlets".

She added, "the government's control over the crossings will materialize in the coming months and not in a short period", noting that, "if the government is able to control the crossings, their share of the budget will be estimated at 25%".

MP Jamal Kojar, a member of the Parliamentary Finance Committee revealed last Monday, in an interview with Shafaq News agency, "corruption in the border crossings is huge and reaches 90%. The state gets no more than a billion dollars from their revenues", noting, "at least 11 billion ends in the pockets of the corrupts".

On July 25, the Joint Operations Command in the Iraqi Army announced deploying security forces to ten land crossings and four ports. These forces, according to the command's statement, will be responsible for protecting those points.

Prime Minister Mustafa Al-Kadhimi launch of a campaign against corruption at the border customs points, saying that the country lost millions of dollars for the mafia taking over there.

Iraq has 22 land and naval ports along its borders with the six countries surrounding it, in addition to 13 airports.