Dubai, Sept 22: Iraq's newly-elected leadership council has unveiled sweeping free-market reforms that would permit foreign investment and impose income taxes, but keep oil under government control.
Yet even the council's US backers conceded that big multinationals were not likely to rush to Iraq, despite its promise, as long as instability reigns and violence erupts daily.
"Capital is a coward," US Treasury Secretary John Snow said yesterday. "It doesn't go places where it feels threatened. Companies will not send employees to places that aren't secure."
Snow was addressing an international banking conference shortly after meeting with Iraq's new Finance Minister, Kamil Mubdir al-Gailani. He applauded al-Gailani's blueprint as "policies at make sense ... That offer real promise."
Addressing the same group of pin-striped private bankers, al-Gailani said his objective was to "promote Iraqi economic growth and raise the living standards of all Iraqis as soon as possible."



The planned reforms mark a sharp departure to what former businessman al-Gailani called a "free and market-oriented economy," which, if successful, would set Iraq apart from its Arab neighbours.



He pledged that Baghdad would "allow up to 100 per cent foreign ownership in all sectors except natural resources." That could mean the selloff of state-owned enterprises, assuming buyers could be found.


Bureau Report