Extensive strategic collaboration agreement is signed between France and Iraq – Elysee
According to the French presidency, French President Emmanuel Macron met with Prime Minister Mohammed Shia Al-Sudani of Iraq on Thursday and signed a number of key agreements to advance their economic partnership.
According to the Elysee Palace on Friday, France and Iraq inked a treaty at the conference that aims to improve their bilateral ties in the areas of culture, security, renewable energy, and anti-corruption.
“Using French expertise, (Macron and Shia al-Sudani) have underlined their commitment to finishing large network infrastructure projects. In that regard, they have promised to provide Iraq with French enterprises’ experience,” said Elysee.
They demonstrated their dedication to putting TotalEnergies’ multiple-energies project, based on solar energy and investments in gas, into action in terms of alternative energies.
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In an effort to stop Western energy corporations from leaving Iraq, Baghdad is reportedly in talks with Qatar to purchase a part in TotalEnergies’ $27 billion cluster of energy projects there, according to Reuters.
When TotalEnergies and Baghdad signed a contract in 2021 to build four major solar, gas, power, and water projects in southern Iraq over a 25-year period, expectations for a reversal of the outflow were high. Exxon Mobil (XOM.N), Shell (SHEL.L), and BP (BP.L) have all tried to scale back their operations in Iraq in recent years.