You're reading: Ukraine’s foreign minister visits Iraq for first time in nine years

Ukrainian Foreign Minister Kostiantyn Gryshchenko's official visit to Iraq is aimed at capitalizing on Ukraine's contribution to the establishment of peace and stability in the state, according to the Foreign Ministry of Ukraine.

“By this visit we want to finally capitalize on the contribution Ukraine made in the middle of 2000s by sending to Iraq one of the most numerous contingents, and by making a significant contribution to the stabilization of the situation in the country,” the director of the information policy department at Ukraine’s Foreign Ministry, Oleh Voloshyn, said in Kyiv on Tuesday.

He added that during the visit on Nov. 20-22, the minister would meet with the president, the prime minister, the chairman of the Council of Representatives, and the foreign minister of Iraq, and with a number of heads of ministries of the country’s economic sphere. Gryshchenko will also meet with the top officials of Iraqi Kurdistan.

In addition, a forum of Ukrainian and Iraqi businessmen will be held.

According to Voloshyn, the potential for cooperation with Iraq, which Ukraine received while helping the country to establish peace and stability, has not been used since 2005, when the Ukrainian contingent was removed from Iraq.

The diplomat also said that it is the first visit of a Ukrainian foreign minister in the last nine years. Ukraine was the first among the CIS member states to send its foreign minister to Iraq. The minister is also being accompanied by the biggest delegation of Ukrainian businessmen in the history of such visits.

Farming, mechanical engineering, and infrastructure projects are the most important spheres of cooperation between Ukraine and Iraq.