Iraqi Officials Warn of Economic ‘Collapse’ If US Cuts Off Access to Oil Revenues

• Gangsterism – Protection Racket – USA-Pentagram. See also:
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  Iraq warns of ‘collapse’ if Trump blocks oil cash
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• The effect is quite clear: Trump is driving Iraq into the arms of Russia-China and away from the Petrodollar. Is this his real intention? To end the bankster’s monetary hegemony, endless wars in the Middle East.
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• Iraqi Officials Warn of Economic ‘Collapse’ If US Cuts Off Access to Oil Revenues
  by https://www.presstv.com/
  Iraqi officials have warned of economic “collapse” if the United States makes good on its threat to cut off its access to a US-based key bank account where oil revenues are kept.
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  President Donald Trump is angered by the Iraqi parliament voting on January 5 to oust all US forces following Washington’s assassination of Iran’s General Qassem Soleimani and Iraq’s Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis.
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  Trump has said if US troops were asked to leave, he would charge the Iraqis “sanctions like they’ve never seen before.” On Friday, he suggested blocking some $35 billion of Iraqi money “right now sitting in an account” in the United States.
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  Agence France-Presse quoted two unnamed Iraqi officials as saying that Washington had delivered an extraordinary verbal message directly to the office of Prime Minister Adel Abdul-Mahdi. The office “got a call threatening that if US troops are kicked out, ‘we’ — the US — will block your account at the Federal Reserve Bank in New York,” one official said.
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  Iraq is the second largest oil producer of OPEC and its oil revenues –which are paid in dollars into the Fed account daily– fund 90 percent of the national budget. “We’re an oil-producing country. Those accounts are in dollars. Cutting off access means totally turning off the tap,” the first Iraqi official said.
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  The second official said, “It would mean collapse for Iraq.” He said the government would not be able to carry out daily functions or pay salaries, adding that such a move would prompt the Iraqi currency to fall in value.
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  The Central Bank of Iraq’s account at the Fed was established in 2003 following the US invasion that toppled ex-dictator Saddam Hussein. According to Iraqi officials the balance now is sitting at about $35 billion.
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  Trump said Friday he had told Abdul-Mahdi that Iraq “should pay back the United States for its investments in the country over the past several years or the American military will stay there,” Fox News reported.
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  “If we leave … you have to pay us for the money we put in,” the US president said. Asked how he planned to collect money from Iraq, Trump said: “Well, we have a lot of their money right now. We have a lot of their money. We have $35 billion of their money right now sitting in an account.
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