ISTANBUL - Iraqi Deputy Trade Minister Fahri Rasan said on Monday that they say ''welcome'' to everybody coming from Turkey, and called on Turkish exporters not to miss opportunities in Iraq.
Addressing the closing session of Turkish Exporters Assembly (TIM)-Iraq delegation meeting, Rasan said Turkish exporters, following today's meeting, got information about economic transformation in Iraq, and that they learned investment opportunities in Iraq.
Rasan said they were open to foreign direct investments, noting that, ''we are open to every kind of investments and cooperation apart from natural resources and mining.''
State Minister Kursad Tuzmen said that due to the information he got from the Iraqi deputy industry and deputy trade ministers, Iraq would be turned into a free zone for investments for the first ten years.
Tuzmen noted that the studies to be undertaken particularly in banking field would be very important, adding that the banking system in Iraq had to be rapidly set up. ''We will do our best to form the banking system in Iraq. The studies continue in this field, but we must speed up those studies,'' Tuzmen said.
''If there was not the Iraqi war, we would have reach 4 billion dollars of export in the year 2004. We couldn't reach that target, but we continue our studies to upgrade the Turkish-Iraq trade,'' Tuzmen said.
TIM Chairman Oguz Satıcı said in his part that the Iraqi deputy industry minister gave information about investments and the Iraqi deputy trade minister gave information about projects of privatization in Iraq.
(ÖŞ-AY) 20.10.2003