#muthanna

Two solar power projects were reportedly given to Chinese corporations by Iraq. This is in accordance with a contract deal between Iraq and China that was reached in 2019 led by former Iraqi Prime Minister Adel Abdul Mahdi.

Both solar installations are in the Al-Muthanna Governorate, which borders Saudi Arabia in southern Iraq. The solar projects have a total capacity of 130 MW and 500 MW, respectively and will be distributed across the Governorate.

With goals to raise renewable energy to 20% of the total energy supply, Iraq has given multiple solar power contracts to international companies including TotalEnergies.

Today, Iraq is suffering from acute power shortages because of corruption and war damages to the energy industry. Being OPEC’s second largest oil producer, Iraq is still reliant on Iranian gas imports for its electricity and until recently, it has looked to diversify its gas import by crafting new agreements with Saudi Arabia.

Iraq .. sit-ins in Muthanna and calls for civil disobedience

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Reuters

                                              Alaa Al-Marjani

Protests in Iraq

Hundreds of people from the southern province of Muthanna held a protest rally on Friday in the center of the city of Samawa, denouncing the "failure to implement their demands" by the local and federal governments.

"The sit-ins will continue until our demands are…

Iraq .. sit-ins in Basra and Muthanna and new demonstrations in Dhi Qar

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Reuters

BAGHDAD (Reuters) – A sit-in organized by youth groups threatened Saturday with sit-ins in the southern Iraqi provinces of Basra and Muthanna unless the Iraqi government implements their demands.

The RT correspondent said that "dozens of demonstrators held in front of the building of the province of Basra, and closed the road near the…

The Islamic State extremist group has taken control of a vast former chemical weapons facility northwest of Baghdad, where remnants of 2,500 degraded chemical rockets filled decades ago with the deadly nerve agent sarin are stored along with other chemical warfare agents, Iraq said in a letter circulated Tuesday at the United Nations.

The U.S. government played down the threat from the takeover, saying there are no intact chemical weapons and it would be very difficult, if not impossible, to use the material for military purposes.

Iraq's U.N. Ambassador Mohamed Ali Alhakim told U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon in a letter that "armed terrorist groups" entered the Muthanna site on June 11, detained officers and soldiers from the protection force guarding the facilities and seized their weapons. The following morning, the project manager spotted the looting of some equipment via the camera surveillance system before the "terrorists" disabled it, he said.

The Islamic State group, which controls parts of Syria, sent its fighters into neighboring Iraq last month and quickly captured a vast stretch of territory straddling the border between the two countries. Last week, its leader, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, declared the establishment of an Islamic state, or caliphate, in the land the extremists control.

A consortium of Asec Cement and Iraq’s Qemmet El-Iraq has won a contract to rehabilitate and manage the Muthanna Cement Plant for 14 years.

Muthanna Cement, located between Najaf and Basra in southern Iraq, is one of seven plants controlled by Southern Cement Company.

The work is set to begin in the second quarter of next year, with a view to reaching a full 2 million tonnes per annum (MTPA) production capacity by August 2016.

Asec Cement chairman and CEO Giorgio Bodo said: “Iraq has embarked on a robust plan to rebuild and modernise its infrastructure and has launched major housing, industrial, and community projects. The rehabilitation of Muthanna is an important part of Iraq’s investment in bridging the supply gap, particularly in the south.”

Asec Cement is a regional cement platform created by Cairo-based private equity firm Citadel Capital and Qemmet El-Iraq is headquartered in Erbil and its activities include construction, contracting and manufacturing packaged food products.

The value of the contract was not disclosed

Iraqi ministry of industry signed and contract with an Egyptian and Iraqi companies to develop Muthana Cement Factory.

This is the third investment project in cement industry; the first was with a French company in Karbala and the second in Babel with a Turkish company.

The duration of the contract will be for 14 years with a target to produce 1.1 million tons per year.

The contracting companies will have a free share in the product that will reach at the end to 540.000 tons annually.

Muthana cement Factory is one of the main projects with a total production capacity of 2 million tons annually, but the previous war circumstance affected negatively its production.