Iraqi President Seeks 'Closer Cooperation'

Iraq's president is currently visiting Germany to meet with a host of top-level politicians. Both sides want to "intensify their cooperation," but they have different ideas of what that means.

A few weeks ago, Germany and Iraq reignited a diplomatic relationship that went sour during the Persian Gulf War in 1991.

Germany's Bernd Erbel presented Iraqi President Ghazi Mashal Ajil al-Yawer his portfolio, as his country's new ambassador to Iraq and Alla Abdul Madshid Hussein al-Hashimi did the same in Berlin. The diplomatic niceties were a necessity ahead of Yawer's visit to Berlin, the first since he became Iraq's first postwar president in June.

While here, Yawer will have the chance to press Chancellor Gerhard Schröder on some issues that have been difficult to negotiate over the phone or on the sidelines of international conferences. Whether Berlin plans to excuse the debt Saddam Hussein racked up in years past, as well as what it can do to encourage German firms to rebuild Iraq are just two of Yawer's burning questions.

German police, companies in Iraq - but not troops

Schröder and his deputies have also shown an interest in closer cooperation with the new government in Iraq. The work German police have been doing in the United Arab Emirates in training the new Iraqi police force will surely be mentioned when Schröder and Yawer meet.

German firms like Siemens and Deutsche Telekom are also working on rebuilding the infrastructure in Iraq, as subcontractors to American companies.

Germany has so far pledged more than €100 million to help rebuild Iraq, half of that through EU funds to which France also contributes. The government also pledged an additional €5 million to help the United Nations' work in the war-torn country.

The German government has, until now, left it at that. Talk of sending German troops down to the region as peacekeepers is routinely rejected by government leaders. Even US Secretary of State Colin Powell conceded that Germany would not send troops to help out the overstretched multinational force in the country.

"We … will engage ourselves within the realm of our possibilities," said German Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer, before a recent trip to the Middle East.

Government aid to German investors in Iraq?

Observers don't believe anything will change on that front when Yawer visits. But perhaps he can convince Schröder to encourage more German companies to invest in Iraq.

Immediately following the end of major combat operations, German, as well as French, companies were shut out of bidding for major reconstruction contracts because of their government's opposition to the war.

Though the tune out of Washington has changed since then, only 60 German companies have chosen to strike up business again and one third of those were firms active in Iraq before the coalition invasion in March 2003.

Chief among the concerns is security as well as confusion over what sort of business legislation is currently in place. In the past, German firms investing in foreign countries have been embolded by export insurance from the government, so-called Hermes guarantees, named after the agency that provides them.

The government hasn't extended any guarantees so far. A German-Iraq chamber of commerce, which could be used to better facilitate German-Iraqi business contacts, is still nonexistent.