The Iraqi government has eased the visa process for oil industry professionals, removing some of the obstacles to the launch of work on the big oil projects in mainly the south of the country. Iraq will now start issuing visas at its international airports directly, according to Reuters.
The ruling comes after oil companies working on the southern mega fields complained that they were being hampered by weeks of waiting for individuals’ entry visas to be issued by the embassies in their respective home countries, and asking for multiple-entry visas to start being issued.
“This obstacle has been overcome with the cooperation of the Ministry of Interior, which thankfully has agreed to issue visas at the Iraqi airports to employees working on the contracts to develop the fields,” Oil Minister Hussein al-Shahristani told Reuters, adding that while other problems such as inadequate capacity at Iraqi ports and roads would take time to address, the government was looking into the possibility of opening up more border crossings with Kuwait.
He also said that discussions have begun on the opening of new border posts specifically for oil equipment in order not to affect the functioning of the Iraqi ports and not to delay the country’s projects due to capabilities of Iraq’s entry ports.
Regarding Iraq’s infrastructural limitations he did, however, remind companies that this had been known at the time of bidding, urging them to stick to honour their commitments. “You need to prove to the whole world that you are able and committed to implement these deals,” Dow Jones reported him telling IOCs during a symposium discussing the challenges in recent days.
IHS Middle East analyst Samuel Ciszuk welcomes the move but says that efficient visa processing at all of Iraq’s ports of entry will need to be in place to avoid unnecessary hold-ups for the hundreds of workers likely to be needed for each of the oil projects.
“The move to issue visas directly at the airports is a major step to easing quick travel in and out of Iraq for IOC engineers, experts, and managers, who still are generally based outside Iraq as companies try to rely on Iraqi personnel as much as possible rather than moving skilled workers into the country,” he said.
“Still, most companies will require the placing of hundreds of workers in Iraq as the projects get under way, and efficient visa procedures will be needed if the projects are not to start suffering short-staffing and delays—given that Western workers in particular might enter for a few months and then have a few months off. A larger bureaucratic and security challenge, however, will be the quicker clearing of goods and machinery imports at Iraqi ports or border crossings, given the continued need to keep security tight and counter smuggling,” observed Ciszuk.
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