Tehran, Iran, May 27
Trend:
At a meeting with economists, businessmen and members of joint chambers of commerce, Iran's President Hassan Rouhani discussed issues related to trade and commerce in the country.
Hamid Hosseini, Head of joint Iran-Iraq joint Chamber of Commerce, talked about the President's meeting with at the chamber of commerce in an interview to Trend.
"The event reflects a new approach towards consultations with economists by the President's public relation," he said. "It was an opportunity for the economists to meet the President and ministers and discuss their problems."
Revealing the meeting details, he added, "The economists raised two issues. The first is related to engaging the private sector in the decision-making by the government, and the second one is about the official foreign currency rate for exports."
In his words, international relations and sanctions were not much talked about.
"I did not have the chance to raise these issues at the meeting. However, I did email to Foreign Minister Javad Zarif and raised a few problems, which he could discuss during his visit to Iraq," Hamid Hosseini said . "I suggested that issues related to removing visa and return of Iraqi debt to be discussed, among others, during presidential visit to Iraq."
Iraq's debts to Iran, worth $2 billion, are due to imports of electricity, gas and other products supplied in past years.
Iranian official arrived in Baghdad last week to hold talks with Iraqi President and Prime Minister about expanding bilateral ties.
"Bypassing the sanctions is not an easy task. If the government is not able to sell oil openly, it has to find unofficial methods to continue the sale. In this regard, insurance from the government is important," he noted.
"The other issue is digital foreign currency. The US monitor the money transfers and this creates obstacles for trade transactions. Thus, the government should provide the ground to to solve this problem," he said.
" We have discussed it with Head of Central Bank of Iran Abdolnaser Hemmati and he said that digital currency would be approved by the cabinet," Hosseini noted. "Hemmati indicated that the agreement, which was signed during his visit to Iraq on the use of Iran's currency blocked in Iraq for imports of basic goods, was approved by Iraqi government.Therefore, Iran can use the money to buy basic goods like food, animal feed and soy bean," he said referring to his meeting with Hemmati on the sidelines of the presidential meeting.