The Energy Committee in the Iraqi province of Wasit announced the stop of Iran’s electricity supplies to Iraq amounting to 1250 MW, since the beginning of 2017, due to the «accumulated» debt , pointing out that the Ministry of Electricity called on all citizens to rationalize consumption and lift the excesses to avoid increasing the hours of the cut . The Chairperson of the Committee, Amal al- Ugaili said , that «the Iranian ministry of Energy halted the electricity supply for Iraq across the four lines, Khrmchehr- Basrah , karkhah – Amara , Mirsad – Diyala, and Serpil Zahab – Khanaqin», noting that «the four lines are out of service altogether, because of the accumulated debts on the Iraqi government to the Iranian Ministry of energy. » . Iranian move came suddenly and without warning, despite the Iraqi Ministry of Electricity paid two months ago an estimated $ 100 million of the owed debt.
Musab al-Mudaris , a spokesman for the Iraqi Ministry of Electricity confirmed the halt by saying: “Iran had halted three lines of super Voltage and ultra-high pressure with a capacity of 1200 MW; and because of the amount of accumulated debt amounted nearly billion dollars.” It is noteworthy that the Iranian regime stopped partially, in July of last year, the electric power supply to Iraq through the lines “Khorramshahr – Basra,” and “Krkhh – Amara”, both of which the capacity of supply of them to reach 800 megawatts, and they were operated later, after repayment of debt. Where the majority of Iraqi provinces are suffering from an increase in the hours of power cuts.
He also states that Iraq is suffering a shortage of electric power since the beginning of the year 1990, and increased hours of rationing power after 2003, in Baghdad and the provinces, because a lot of stations are old as well as the exposure to the sabotage attacks on facilities over the past few years, that the hours of power cuts for citizens had been increased to about twenty hours per day. The issue a power in Iraq has become an issue for the financial corruption, like other basic services, prompting successive governments since 2003 to postpone thinking about it to indefinite perspective. After that successive governments have become confident of their inability to provide self- electricity resorted to signing an agreement with the Iranian government to import the bulk of Iraq’s need of electricity, making the country at the mercy of the Iranians.
The Iranian behavior in this way raises a state of surprise , especially among those who pursue of the path of “progress” in the Iranian-Iraqi relations in the post-2003, noting that in order to get billion of US dollars, the Iranian regime halted the electric supply to Iraq and forgot completely of what has been provided to it by Iraq in all forms of material support in the era of former Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki, to ease the burden of the economic sanctions imposed on the Iranian regime against the backdrop of its nuclear program.
The support was not restricted at this level to this regime , but has taken many forms since Iraq has become in the era of Nuri al-Maliki the main supporter for the rule of Bashar al-Assad to suppress his own people and to provide material support for him as Iraq has become an air and ground conduit for Iranian Shiite militias to fighting alongside the ally of the Iranian regime in Syria . If we assume that Iraq is an ally of the Iranian regime and not the state is going in the pole of Iranian influence, the common logic says the Iranian regime should to stand by his ally, and in particular it passes a severe economic crisis, but the opposite happened as Iranian ally increases the pain of the Iraqi ally. So for the Iranian regime , the interests is thing and the doctrine and the sect. something else , contrary to what Iraqi officials sought to play on it, when they misled their people that it is interested in the salvation of Iraq through the development of services in it.
And with this cutting, political analysts said that the Iranian regime is dealing with Iraq, under the rule of the allied Shiite parties, as a subsidiary, and not as an independent country, arguing that these parties do not move except in accordance with its rules and interests. And the agreement to buy electricity from the Iranian regime can be viewed from a political party as part of a project of the ruling religious parties in Iraq to serve the Iranian economy by providing hard currency and in a a permanent way, let alone to put a vital part of basic services in the grip of Iranian institution which is contrary to what many believe noting that it put its own economic interest above all other considerations, including sectarian considerations.
Isn’t Iraq as a result of the current economic, security, political and military conditions considered one of the most vulnerable countries that should the Iranian regime to stand by it as being :
first a neighbor State of it
Second Iraq is an Islamic state of the same religious doctrine
Isn’t right for the Iranian regime to stand by it, but the regime to cut off the Iranian oil supplies about Iraq It confirms and there is no doubt that the “Islamic” speech sticking on it is only slogans have no value and worthless when it collides to its supreme interests noting that according to those interests we see the face of the Iranian revolutionary regime and statist face .the sectarian factor is very limited in the Iranian regime’s relations with the States and even if they follow the same doctrine, and its tense relations with Azerbaijan is a proof of that, but the sectarian factor is clearly emerged in its ties with non-statist groups like Hezbollah in Lebanon and the Shiite parties and militias in Iraq and the Houthis in Yemen .
All of Iraq positions towards the Iranian regime did not intercede in the economic sanctions stage that were imposed upon it, and the positions that the Central Bank of Iraq has become in the era of Nuri al-Maliki, a follower of the Central Bank of Iran to mitigate the impact of those sanctions, also did not intercede for the presence of Iraqi militias allied to the Iranian regime to fight alongside Bashar al-Assad, as when the Iranian regime to stop electricity supply for the southern provinces in Iraq is essentially to cut off the electricity about the people of militias in those provinces as they are fighting in Syria to defend about its expansion project in the Levant, while the Iranian regime increases the pain of their loved ones in the south of Iraq in particular .
The summary of saying : the ethics of Islam taken by Iran as the basic Marjaa for its political regime are to relief Muslims and to overcomes their pains , Iraq today does not require from the Iranian regime to open its treasures to it , but at least to consider those previous positions of Iraq and to be patient a bit on the Iraqi debt and we don’t say to abolish it as it was done by some countries towards each other but to consider positions.
The unity of the Iraqi Studies
Translated by : Mudhaffar Kusairi
Rawabet Center for Research and Strategic Studies