A recent trip to the largely autonomous Kurdistan Region in Iraq challenged some mistaken assumptions and convinced me that it is safe and stable with some golden opportunities for companies in the North East and nationally. UK companies have invested £3bn there in the last six months.
I was there with a cross-party group called the Westminster Foundation for Democracy which runs training programmes for parliaments which seek to understand, adopt or adapt our practices.
Kurdistan's democratically elected parliament was established less than 20 years ago only after the then Prime Minister John Major saved the Kurds from almost biblical scenes of misery and death. Saddam Hussein's army had driven hundreds of thousands of starving Kurds into the freezing mountains on the border with Turkey as part of a long-term genocidal campaign to eliminate the Kurds.
Together with the Americans and the French, Britain instituted a safe haven and a no-fly zone which allowed the Kurds to return home and start building a new society from scratch after suffering a scorched earth policy by the Iraqi dictator.
It soon became clear the leaders and people of this small but hospitable place are deeply grateful to the British. English is widely spoken and many leaders spent years in exile here. Most of their government's scholarship programmes are based in UK universities so the connection can continue.
They have just had the first UK Film Festival in Erbil, although there is no cinema there as yet. The British envoy helping organise it and they showed films such as Brassed Off and Made in Dagenham.
The Iraqi Kurds have transformed their society from a conflict-ridden backwater to a thriving and growing hub. There are many new universities, near continuous electricity compared to just four hours in the rest of Iraq and shiny new hotels, malls and housing. Their per capita income has increased ten-fold. They know they have more to do and encourage critical scrutiny to help get things right.
Their wealth is based on oil and gas with substantial potential in minerals, agriculture and tourism. Yes, tourism. It is the safest part of Iraq with no terror incidents since 2007 and very few before that, plus sites that will attract tourists. Erbil, the capital, is the oldest continually inhabited city in the world and there are broad plains where Alexander the Great fought.
The Kurds want companies to help get the oil out of the ground. Saddam used some of his country's oil to repress the Kurds who now see it as a means of protecting themselves.
British companies are making their way to Kurdistan. There's work in oil and gas and the infrastructure that goes with it.
Britain and companies, small and large, can help themselves but also help Kurdistan reach its potential and remain a strong friend of the UK. What's good for Kurdistan can be good for Britain.
North East companies that feel they could trade with or invest in Kurdistan can contact me and I will connect them with the relevant authorities.
Newcastle Chronicle and Journal
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