KTFA:

Clare:  Members of the House of Representatives leave the parliament building in protest against the delay of sessions

12/1/2024

Members of the Iraqi Parliament decided on Sunday to leave the parliament building in protest against the delay in holding sessions.

A parliamentary source told Shafaq News Agency that a number of members of the House of Representatives expressed their dissatisfaction with the presidency of the House of Representatives and began to leave the building of the House of Representatives due to the delay of the session by four hours from its scheduled time.

He pointed out that all the representatives decided to leave the parliament building without waiting.  LINK

Clare:  The House of Representatives postpones its session until tomorrow, Monday

12/1/2024  Baghdad - I.A. 

The media department of the House of Representatives announced today, Sunday, the postponement of the session until tomorrow, Monday.

A statement by the department received by the Iraqi News Agency (INA) stated that "the House of Representatives decided to postpone its session until tomorrow, Monday."   LINK

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Opinion:

SThomas:  The BRICS have been talking about establishing a currency for a long time, essentially Biden’s entire term, but it has yet to materialize. The trade bloc represents half the world population and almost half its GDP, yet rather than moving forward with implementing a new currency they just continue to tease the world with the concept while demonstrating the viability of other options to exclude the USD from international trade settlement. Why?

Perhaps bc the plan was never to move forward with replacing the USD via a new world reserve currency, but rather to demonstrate its vulnerability against emerging technologies (crypto) and, more importantly, precious metal and asset backed currencies.

The whole de-dollarization movement is not designed to crush the USD, but rather to force its backing with tangible assets and to demonstrate the futility of using fiat-based sanctions as a weapon on the geopolitical stage against nations who actually back their monetary system with precious metals.

 It’s also been about showing the world that our entire debt-based system crumbles in on itself once foreign nations refuse to monetize it.

Remember that this is a movie and Trump has been working directly with the BRICS leaders all along. Imo …This is red meat for his base: coming out strong against de-dollarization and declaring the USD king. Do you really expect anything less?

Trump is once again demonstrating (albeit in the context of the movie) the art of the deal. He is establishing the terms of negotiations which will undoubtedly unfold once he is sworn in. But watch him pivot to the need for PM backed currency in the process.

He is not defending the fiat system folks; that’s why he is going to audit the FED and the IRS, why he has embraced the SBR, which will force the FED to fund the purchase of bitcoin to pay off the debt and, in the process, redistribute the real wealth the cabal has stolen from the people. This is the tool the WH chose to use in order to put the cabal’s assets into circulation for the benefit of humanity.

We all know that if the Fiat debt prison isn’t dissolved then we can never have a golden age, but there’s a reason Trump told us to get ready for one. Don’t be fooled by his rhetoric…it’s all part of the movie. He will go to the negotiating table and a new US monetary policy will emerge. IMO

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Clare:  With the document.. The Central Bank directs to stop financial transactions of TikTok agents inside Iraq

12/1/2024

The Central Bank of Iraq directed banks to stop incoming and outgoing financial transactions for TikTok agents inside Iraq.

On March 25, 2024, the Ministry of Communications announced that it had submitted a request to the Council of Ministers to block the TikTok application, noting that the application had contributed to the "disintegration" of the Iraqi social fabric and that it had no scientific or educational benefit and was merely an entertainment application.

It pointed out that "many countries had blocked TikTok, most notably the United States of America, in addition to Canada and other countries."  LINK

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Clare:  Rafidain begins distributing retirees' salaries

12/1/2024

Raidain Bank announced the start of distributing the salaries of civilian and military retirees for the current month of December through electronic payment tools.

The bank's media office stated in a statement received by {Al Furat News} that "retirees who receive text messages can receive their salaries from anywhere they are," stressing that the distribution process was carried out smoothly to facilitate procedures for beneficiaries.   LINK

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Clare:  2025 budget on the table of the Parliamentary Finance Committee and the Ministry of Oil

12/1/2024 Baghdad

Today, Sunday, the Parliamentary Finance Committee hosted the Undersecretary of the Ministry of Oil to discuss the draft federal general budget law. 

The Parliamentary Finance Committee hosted the senior staff of the Ministry of Oil and its Undersecretary for Extraction Affairs, Basem Mohammed Khadir, the Director General of the State Oil Marketing Company (SOMO) Khadir Abbas Abdul, the Director General of the Economic Department Alaa Al-Yasiri, and the Director of the Legal Department in the Ministry, Salam Hamdan.

The hosting came to discuss the draft law of the first amendment to the Federal General Budget Law for the fiscal years (2023-2024-2025) No. (13) of 2023.  LINK

Clare:  Monetary stability achieves economic stability and sustainable development

12/1/2024  Samir Al-Nusairi  

On the sidelines of the participation of the Governor of the Central Bank in the opening of the activities of the Arab Sustainable Development Week Forum in its fifth edition, which was held in the Egyptian capital, Cairo, this week, he confirmed that the monetary situation in Iraq is very excellent through the achieved indicators and basic goals on which the monetary policy is based in supporting the government’s orientations to diversify, stimulate and strengthen the national economy, and exit the circle of the rentier economy dependent on oil revenues, which constitutes a major flaw in the structure of the economy.

When there is no diversified production base in the important productive economic sectors, namely agriculture and industry, this cannot be achieved without a strong, solid, and developed banking sector capable of forming the main financing and investment link in financing, qualifying, and developing projects with a productive dimension and increasing the revenues of the general budget by rates exceeding 30% during the years of the National Development Plan 2024-2028.

This requires the necessity of activating the banking sector and stabilizing the pillars of the monetary position, which is in building “foreign reserves, which amounted to more than 100 billion dollars and 153 tons of gold, and constitute an adequacy ratio of 140% to enable the Central Bank to cover and support the defense of the exchange rate, achieve monetary stability, and cover imports, despite the difficult and complex circumstances surrounding the countries of the geographical region.

This enabled the Central Bank to control the general level of prices and inflation, which decreased from 7.5% in January 2023 to 3.8% currently, which is the lowest rate compared to inflation rates in Arab and regional countries, as the Central Bank continues to provide dollars for trade at the official price. It achieved a qualitative shift to regulate foreign trade financing.

New channels have also been opened for transfers using other currencies, such as Turkey, India and China, in addition to European countries. This will make the process of foreign transfers more flexible, streamlined, transparent, controlled and compliant with international standards that enhance confidence and credibility in the operations we carry out.” This means that the Central Bank is moving steadily towards achieving the objectives of monetary policy and achieving economic stability in accordance with Law No. 56 of 2004.  LINK

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Clare:  Parliamentary Integrity Committee accuses former Iraqi Central Bank employee of being behind US sanctions

12/1/2024

The Parliamentary Integrity Committee accused, on Sunday, a former employee of the Central Bank of being behind the banking sanctions imposed on some Iraqi banks by the US Federal Reserve. 

The number of banks sanctioned is 32 out of 72 banks operating in Iraq. 

Member of the Parliamentary Integrity Committee, Vian Dakhil, said in a statement received by Shafak News Agency, that a former employee of the Central Bank hid emails received from the Federal Bank, JP Morgan and Citibank to inquire about some topics related to the bank's work. 

She added that failure to respond to these issues led to some banks being punished, stressing that most banks do not know the reason for the penalties imposed on them. 

On the other hand, economic expert Mustafa Akram Hantoush told Shafak News Agency that the statements of the members of the Parliamentary Integrity Committee are closer to reality than the statements of the Central Bank of Iraq. 

He added that the collapse of the Iraqi banking system and the punishment of 32 Iraqi banks without any clear charges during a period of (a year and a half) is not normal and from the banking work perspective this may be the first incident of this kind in the world.

Hantoush pointed out that the worst thing is the lack of serious solutions by the Central Bank of Iraq to this situation, but rather the move towards cancelling the (Fitr) platform by the end of 2024 and handing over the dollar file to banks affiliated with foreign investors and banks (Jordanian and Gulf). 

Hantoush wondered whether the Central Bank of Iraq knows that by not finding solutions for the Iraqi banking sector, it will fire the mercy bullet at the entire Iraqi banking system and it will be punished as a whole, which will lay off nearly (100) thousand workers in the Iraqi private banking sector for the benefit of Jordan and the Gulf States, and why are Iraqi banks not guaranteed to open an account for them in the correspondent banks in dollars (Citibank / JP Morgan) like the countries of the region did.

He continued, "Why has the mechanism for cooperation and auditing with Ernst & Young regarding transfers in currencies other than the dollar not yet been determined and announced?"   LINK