Indian External Affairs Minister Salman Khurshid will visit Iraq from June 19-20.
During this two-day visit, Khurshid is expected to meet his Iraqi counterpart Hoshyar Zebari, Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, and Deputy Prime Minister Hussain al-Shahristani. The two sides are expected to discuss bilateral, regional, and international issues of mutual interest.
India’s energy needs will be an important part of Khurshid’s agenda during this visit. In 2012, Iraq emerged as the second largest supplier of crude oil to India after Saudi Arabia. Given the U.S. sanctions on Iran, India is looking at increasing its import of Iraqi crude oil, and the government of Iraq has offered to increase the country’s oil exports to India by as much as 30%.
The visit is also expected to revive the warm relations shared by the two countries before the Gulf War of 2003. The India-Iraq Joint Commission for Economic and Technical Cooperation, which met periodically before the Gulf War, last met in 2007. This visit is expected to revive the mechanism and re-energise India-Iraq ties. In 2011-2012, bilateral trade between the two countries stood at $19.7 billion.