Iraq must protect Iranian tanker drivers, citizens: MP

  TIN news:    An Iranian lawmaker says the Islamic Republic will not allow its fuel tankers to enter Iraq until Baghdad guarantees security of Iranian drivers and other citizens.
 
“The Iraqi government is responsible for security of the Iranian fuel tankers drivers and other Iranian citizens on the country’s soil,” Fathollah Hosseini, a member of Iran’s Majlis National Security and Foreign Policy Committee, said on Sunday.
 
    “At present, no guarantee has been provided by the other side; therefore, the transit of fuel though Parviz Khan border (western Iran) has stopped until the issue is resolved,” he added.
 
Transit of oil by tankers from Iraqi Kurdistan Region to Iran’s southern ports has stopped at Parviz Khan border crossing since last week due to security reasons.
 
Before the new development, nearly 500 tankers carried Iraq’s oil products to Iran and a similar number of tankers returned to Iraq to be loaded.
 
The crisis in Iraq escalated after the ISIL terrorists took control of Mosul, Iraq’s second largest city, on June 10.
 
The takeover was followed by the fall of Tikrit, located 140 kilometers (87 miles) northwest of the capital, Baghdad. Tikrit later came under control of the Iraqi army again.
 
The United Nations said in a new report on Friday that more than 5,570 people have been killed in Iraq since January.