Iraq plans to buy cars, buses

Iraq plans to buy cars, buses

BAGHDAD (AFP): Iraq has signed contracts to buy 10,000 Toyota cars and mini-buses, 300-million-dollars worth of Volvo bulldozers and 500 buses from the Egyptian firm Al-Nasr, newspapers reported Wednesday.

Al-Rafidain weekly said Iraq signed a contract with Japanese firm Toyota during the Baghdad international trade fair for around 5,000 cars and a similar number of mini-buses.

Contracts have also been signed with Swedish company Volvo for bulldozers worth 300 million dollars and Al-Nasr for 500 buses, Al-Ilam said.

Ahmad Wakil, the Mercedes and Renault dealer in Egypt, said he had "already exported 530 minibuses, 66 buses, 46 fire engines and 12 petrol tankers for more than 40 million dollars".

"We hope to seal other contracts," he told AFP at the fair, adding his company had just opened a workshop in Baghdad.

And Kamal Khairallah of Egypt's Al-Handasiya car company said a contract had been signed six weeks ago "to export tractors and transport vehicles for Baghdad's municipality".