The Iraqi Ports Administration announced today that a power generation vessel arrived at Khor al-Zubair port last week.

Aswat al-Iraq reports that the Turkish vessel will supply the national electrical grid with 110 megawatts of power.

This is the third electricity generation vessel to arrive in Basra province.

Two vessels are already working in Umm Qasr port supplying the network with 200 megawatts.

(Source: Aswat al-Iraq)

Umm Qasr port administration has announced the seizure of materials contaminated with radioactive isotopes imported from Japan, according to Aswat al-Iraq.

A source told the news agency that an imported fork-lift, heading for the private sector, was discovered to have been contaminated by radiation.

No information was given on the volume of radiation in the equipment.

The minister of planning announced that Japanese materials will be embargoed for a period of two to three months due to radioactive contamination from the Fukushima Power plant (pictured).

(Source: Aswat al-Iraq)

Azzaman reports that the Ministry of Industry and Minerals has asked South Korean firm Daewoo to rehabilitate its steel industry, which has been idle for more than three decades.

Iraq had built one of the Middle East’s largest steel complexes, called the State Company for Iron and Steel, near the port of Umm Qasr, about 45 km south of Basra.

According to the report, the complex was built by a French company and partly completed by the late 1970s, but production was halted  in 1980 with the start of the Iraq-Iran war.

The company, with a capacity of 1.2 million tons a year, was projected to meet domestic needs. But the halt of production has turned Iraq into a major steel and iron importer.

The Industry and Minerals Ministry has issued several invitations for foreign investors to upgrade and repair its iron and steel industries.

The ministry is offering a share of the production to investors willing to repair, modernize and rehabilitate the company.

A team of Daewoo experts is scheduled to travel to the southern Province of Basra and inspect the company.

(Sources: Azzaman, Construction Weekly)

The Iraqi Electricity Ministry has said that a third Turkish ship will arrive within a few days in the Umm Qasr port (pictured) to supply 108 megawatts of power to Iraq’s struggling electricity grid.

A spokesman for the ministry has added that two other Turkish floating power plants off southern Iraq supply a total of 180 megawatts to the country.

(Source: AME Info)

A few dozen Iraqis protested on Wednesday against Kuwaiti plans for a new port near Umm Qasr, Iraq’s only deep-water port.

AKnews reports that public committees from Basra organized the protests to show public opposition against the Kuwaiti Mubarak port across the border.

“Everyone knows that Kuwait does not need this port since it has a sufficient number of ports”, organizer Abd al-Lazem al-Tai said. He speculated that the current business conflict between the two countries is rooted in the historical disputes over oil wells in Safwan and South Rumaila.

Mr Tai also criticized the Iraqi government for high taxes that would diminish Umm Qasr’s competitive position.

Today’s demonstrations were attended by fewer citizens than expected. Public committees in Basra had announced on Sunday they would assemble more than a thousand citizens in front of Umm Qasr.

Last week, the Kuwaitis laid the foundation stone for the construction of Mubarak port, just over the border from the site of a new Iraqi ‘Grand Faw’ port currently in construction, and close to Umm Qasr.

According to economists, Iraq’s main port will lose 60 per cent of its business if Kuwait goes ahead with its plans.

Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki ordered the formation of an emergency committee to travel to Kuwait immediately to tackle the dispute between the two countries.

(Sources: AKnews, Zawya)

A shipping agent in Basra said on Sunday that private sector shipping companies   continued to strike for the sixth consecutive day in Khor Al-Zubair and Umm Qasr ports.

A spokesman in Basra told AKnews that “our demands are focused on activating Law of 51 that the Iraqi Ministry of Transport refrains from its implementation, though it effective on other government institutions since 2003, as well as the abolition of the Law 86 of 1985, which marginalized the role of the private maritime sector.”

Law 51, which was launched by the civil administrator in Iraq , Paul Bremer in 2003 states on the need to find an area of legitimate competition between the public and private sectors with regard to the work of state institutions, while Act 86 of 1985 limits the work of marine agencies.

The spokesman called on the authorities to explain why the government’s shipping company can impose heavy taxes on cargo and vessels without providing any service.

“The representatives of all private companies are determined to continue the strike in case of failure to achieve their demands in activating the role of the private sector.”

Shipping company of the Iraqi Ministry of Transportation declined from making any statement on the grounds that it is not authorized.

(Source: AKnews)

The director of the Iraqi Ports Company said on Thursday that the company signed its second contract with the Emirati company Gulftainer to establish a dry port north of Umm Qasr port, at a cost of $150 million [180 billion Iraqi dinars], according to a report from AKnews.

Khudair Aboud said that the project is part of a plan to upgrade the transport system in Iraq, which includes ports, railways and roads, and this is the first step in the establishment of logistic infrastructure.

“The project includes the construction of the dry port on an area of 300 acres, five refrigerated and unrefrigerated warehouses, the building of management and services building, and construction of roads entering and leaving the port of Umm Qasr and bringing 48 cranes and tankers.”

Keith Nitel, the commercial director of Gulftainer, told AKnews that “the contract value is $ 150 million and the duration of the joint operation is three years; it will be completed in one year.”

“This project is of great importance as it links Iraq commercially with the world through the dry canal that the company will esablish.”

Gulftainer will rehabilitate berth number seven in Umm Qasr port and it started receiving commercial ships since last March. The company’s investment is estimated at about $ 500 million over a number of projects related to ports, transportation projects and local airports.

Iraq has five ports in Basra province (550 km south of the Iraqi capital of Baghdad): Umm Qasr port, Abu Fulus, Khor Zubair, Faw port, Khor Abdullah and al-Amaya oil port.

(Source: AKnews)

Basra’s port of Umm Qasr received a shipment of more than 40,000 tons of rice on Sunday.

According to the head of public relations at Iraq’s ports department, Anmar al-Safi, the shipment was for the Ministry of Trade.

“The ship Captain Hady from the Bahamas anchored at a quay in Umm Qasr with 40,045 tons of imported rice for the trade ministry,” Anmar al-Safi told Aswat al-Iraq news agency.

(Source: Aswat al-Iraq)