Simon Watkins
Oilprice.comApril 8, 2020, 4:00 PM MDT
Under its effective leader,firebrand ultra-nationalist cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, Iraq is theoretically committed to not allowing itself to become overly dependent on any one country. That was the rallying call of al-Sadr’s ‘Sairoon’ (‘Marching Forward’) power bloc during the last general election in Iraq in May 2018 that saw him and his grouping win the most seats of any party. For a while, this theory seemed to be in effect, with Iraq playing off Chinese and Russian interests against those of the U.S. All the time, though, in practice, Iran continued to dodge and weave around any and all sanctions aimed at preventing it from continuing to wield the deciding power in its neighbour through the leverage of its military, militias, and pro-Iran politicians in Baghdad. The surest sign yet that the U.S. has had enough of this situation came in the shape of the latest waiver granted just over a week ago by the U.S. to Iraq to continue to import Iranian electricity and natural gas – just 30 days, its shortest waiver ever, by a long way.
At the same press conference that Morgan Ortagus, a U.S. State Department spokeswoman, announced the new short waiver, she also pointedly announced new sanctions against 20 Iran- and Iraq-based entities that were cited as funnelling money to Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps’ (IRGC) elite Quds Force. This Force functions in large part as Iran’s chief foreign intelligence operation, as well as its most zealous military unit – more akin to Russia’s GRU than the U.K.’s SIS – having been built up and led by General Qassem Soleimani until his assassination by the U.S. on 3 January. According to Ortagus – and absolutely correct – these 20 entities (there are more than that but this is a start) are exploiting Iraq’s dependence on Iran as an electricity and gas source by smuggling Iranian petroleum through the Iraqi port of Umm Qasr (true, and other sites) and money laundering through Iraqi front companies (also true), among other sanctions-busting activities. Prior to this 30-day only waiver being granted, the U.S. had originally granted an initial 45-day waiver to Iraq after the U.S. re-imposed sanctions on Iranian energy exports in November 2018.
This was followed by another five waivers – two 90-day waivers in a row followed by two 120-day waivers in a row in June and October, and then a 45-day waiver in February before the U.S. specifically asked that Iraq show signs that it was reducing its imports of Iranian gas and power to meet its electricity demand. Clearly these were not forthcoming and, according to sources in Washington close to the Presidential Administration spoken to by OilPrice.com last week, unless Iraq does show the U.S. some compelling evidence to this effect, this will be the last waiver for Iraq to import Iranian energy. “We’ve been down this road before with Pakistan – [with] the government pretending to help in our fight against AQ [Al-Qaeda] but at the same time the ISI [Inter-Services Intelligence] offering all the help it could to [Osama] bin Laden and we’re not playing that game again,” the source underlined.
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