Baghdad Delays New Iraqi Customs Law
As disagreements persist with Erbil, Baghdad has requested that an unimplemented customs tariff law be postponed in what some see as a bid to buy time for tensions to cool.
An Iraqi customs law, held up for almost three years, may still stall because of a dispute between Baghdad and the Kurdistan Region over the collection of customs revenue at border crossings.
The Iraqi parliamentary finance committee has announced that it added amendments to the law regulating the levying of a customs tariff on goods entering the country, enacted Feb. 2, 2010. The government had then requested to postpone its implementation in order to avoid price increases, provided that this law enters into force as of June 30, 2013.
The Iraqi government had requested that the implementation of this law, by virtue of which the customs fees on imported goods are collected in accordance with the rates specified in the customs duty rate table and crop calendar, be postponed for one year “in order to preserve market prices and protect consumers.”
In an interview with Al-Monitor, MP Amin Hadi, a member of the Iraqi parliamentary finance committee, said that “All members of the finance committee agreed to submit the customs tariff law to vote, and there were no objections.” Hadi continued, “We discussed the government’s request to postpone the implementation of the law for one year,” and explained that “The law will be gradually implemented over a period of three years, once it is passed.”
