Turkey and Iraq have agreed to start trading electricity as soon as Iraq makes the necessary updates to its infrastructure, Turkey's Energy and Natural Resources Minister Fatih Dönmez said yesterday.

In discussions between Dönmez and Iraqi Minister of Electricity Luay Al-Khateeb for new bilateral electricity sector projects, Dönmez expressed Turkey's willingness to support Iraq in updating its interconnection infrastructure.

Updating the electricity network infrastructure in Iraq is crucial in moving forward with new projects, Dönmez said. "As Turkey, we are ready to provide the necessary support for Iraq's electricity infrastructure," he said, adding that Turkey's construction sector along with electricity equipment manufacturers could help Iraq address the shortcoming in its electricity grid.

The meeting comes after Dönmez sat down with Iraq's Oil Minister in Baghdad on Wednesday where the two reviewed construction of a new oil pipeline to run parallel with the existing Iraq-Turkey oil pipeline. The existing Iraq-Turkey pipeline stretches almost 1,000 kilometers from Kirkuk to Turkey's southeastern port of Ceyhan on the Mediterranean Sea. However, the Kirkuk portion of the pipeline is severely damaged after being sabotaged by Daesh terrorists, and it has not been in operation since March 2014. This proposed oil pipeline is set to have the capacity to carry oil resources both from the north and south of Iraq and be linked to the Basra-Aqaba pipeline, according to Ghadhban.The planned 1,700 kilometer-long Basra-Aqaba pipeline will transport oil from Iraq's southern city of Basra to the Jordanian port city of Aqaba on the Red Sea's Gulf, with a planned transfer capacity of 1 million barrels of oil per day. The project is awaiting approval from Iraq's Council of Ministers.