Politics

KRG delegation to visit Baghdad for budget implementation talks

The delegation will mainly focus on the Region’s public salaries as well as the Region’s share in the federal budget, an informed source told Kurdistan 24 on Wednesday.

Kurdistan 24 2023/08/30 12:50

KRG ministers and top officials during a meeting in Baghdad, Dec. 13, 2022. (Photo: KRG)

Kurdistan Iraq KRG Baghdad Budget

ERBIL (Kurdistan 24) – A new Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) delegation is set to visit Baghdad on Wednesday to discuss the semi-autonomous region’s share in the federal budget, which has not been implemented by Baghdad since its adoption in June.

The delegation will mainly focus on the Region’s public salaries as well as the share in the federal budget, an informed source told Kurdistan 24 on Wednesday.

The Kurdish officials were supposed to visit the Iraqi capital on Friday, but the visit was postponed due to the death of the federal oil minister’s father.

Since its adoption in early June, KRG diplomats have alleged the budget has not been implemented properly by the government. Instead of paying the Kurdish share, they allege Baghdad has released allowances to Erbil in order to cover the public salaries. The KRG has previously said the 500 billion dinars (over $384 million) is not sufficient to pay the salaries.

Hailed as one of the country’s biggest budgets, the state expenditures were set at 198.91 trillion Iraqi dinars ($153 billion), with a deficit of more than 64 trillion dinars (over $48 billion).

The Kurdistan Region’s share in the federal budget is set at 12.67 percent, amounting to more than $12 billion annually.

The management of oil and gas has been among the thorny issues between Erbil and Baghdad for over a decade, leading to the suspension of the Region’s share in previous federal budgets.