Iraq has given and will continue to grant priority to Arab countries in its trade dealings, Iraqi Trade Minister Mohammad Mehdi Salah said on Monday.
In a statement to the official Iraqi News Agency (INA), Salah said since the United Nations oil-for-food program was put into effect in December 1996, Iraq has dealt half of its foreign trade, or 14.5 billion US dollars, with Arab countries.
Under the UN oil-for-food deal, Egypt has been Iraq's largest Arab trade partner with a volume of 3.5 billion dollars, Jordan ranks the second with 2.8 billion dollars, followed by the United Arab Emirates and Syria with trade volumes standing at 2.6 billion and 1.5 billion dollars respectively, Salah said.
Overall, Russia remains Iraq's top trade partner with bilateral trade exchange boasting 5.5 billion dollars, he added.
The external trade of Iraq, under stringent UN sanctions since its 1990 invasion of Kuwait, has been limited within the framework of the UN oil-for-food program.
The program allows sanctions-hit Iraq to sell oil in return for UN-monitored imports of food, medicine and other essentials to offset the impact of the sanctions.
The minister said that the program has been turned into a program paying for the UN expenses, war compensations, and balancing oil prices at the international market, rather than easing the hardship of the Iraqi people.
Salah told the INA that since December 1996, a total of 18 billion dollars have been deducted by the UN to cover its activities and pay war compensations, while only 15 billion dollars worth of humanitarian goods arrived in Iraq, in sharp comparison with Iraq's oil export totalled at 50 billion dollars.
To make the situation worse, humanitarian contracts valued at 6. 36 billion dollars have been put on hold by the UN Sanctions Committee, in which the US and Britain are key members, Salah said.
The contracts Iraq signed with other countries under the UN oil-for-food deal must be vetted and approved by the UN Sanctions Committee.
Monday marked the fifth anniversary of Iraq's resumption of oil outflow after a halt for more than six years.
On December 10, 1996, Iraq's oil export via the Turkish Mediterranean port of Ceyhan was resumed following the long interruption since August 6, 1990 when the UN Security Council imposed sanctions on the country.
Iraq has often chastised the oil-for-food program for failing to meet the humanitarian needs of its 22 million people.
Nevertheless, Iraq on December 1 accepted the rollover of the program, of which its 11th phase was extended by the UN Security Council for another six months to May 30, 2002.
(People's Daily December 11, 2001)
