with the chamber and our companies to when this variant barely they are in many respects. we'll sort link up and i going forward to having to have that has a massive overhead cost for u.s. and western companies other countries other nations do not incur puts us immediately at a competitive disadvantage. looking at it from the business case. >> thank you very much. there is lots more security topics i would like to get onto. but to make sure panels get equal time, in their field of expertise. you start tracking the fifth anniversary of the protest in baghdad. you start to see huge uprising. can you talk about some of your reflections on where we are now five years later? and you think the u.s. government could have, should have, would have done more to

demand? part two separate questions there.

because it's truly their only way out of the social situation they're in. but if you look at the wide growing middle class the idea is they truly want a government that pace for everything from them from the cradle to the grave literally and they're not that different from their parents generation. and a lot of the protest in that case were about preserving this.

and if you speak to a lot of them they have this idea that they want to be like the gulf with a population of, you know, 40 plus million people which is unsustain coble there's a big component that have. there's a component of wanting to fight corruption in a huge issue that i think everyone in society is aware of and, of course, there's a -- smaller group of activist who have a strong political orientation and understanding where they want the country to go and who are the one who is write out their plans for what they want iraq to look like and message gets carried across but i think we have to be a bit more honest about the full taps industry about what is in the country and, of course, we focus on ones that are like oh look they don't want iran but opinion polls in iraq they have the same favorable among iraqis but we portray the ones that we think is beneficial to our vision of what we want to push in iraq.

so i really strongly recommend reading more about the protest movements from new wave of judge scholars who have been embedded in them and have more clear eyed vision of differentiating between the echelon and every day iraqis why and they want protest and like i said as for the u.s. i can't really comment on whether they would have done more or less own they wouldn't have done anything to demock ar- and we get really -- we get very worried because it is a country going in the right direction or is there going to be a democratic back flighting x, y, z party going to control everything but we tonged forget this is a very young political system. and for 80% of its history, after 2003 it is embroiled in war so i think a generation actually develop before immediately jumping in to

intervene or portray them in one way or another. thawnch very much and is this something you've been counted as you -- your role is trying to expand investment in -- in -- from west u.s. in iraq, and mentioned the younger population, and is this something that you -- come across is a -- is a go for young population to be -- doing more? >> so many interesting things a couple of observations is definitely when it come to the work force. and having kind of wholesome educations that equip them for, you know, the jobs of tomorrow. so i think and again that has been to be driven by iraq but i think there's opportunities for u.s. companies to help guide like, you know, as we do invest as we do business with iraq. what type of, you know, talents and skills are we looking for. and ij that it is important to take those two consideration --

when you think, you know, what type of economy does iraq want to have, obviously, there's going to be a role for engineers in the energy field. but beyond that. you know when you look at the risk flight in the economy and i do think it is interesting, you know, there's definitely a clique or grouch people who are very interested in having that vibrant start of ecosystem and it is empowering and it does create a so it is creating regulatory and policy environment, and the enablers that allow for that. and there can be, you know, a role for outside, you know, u.s. investment or incubators to play but a lot of that has to come internally and people have to be allowed, you know, to be unleashed and to succeed. but i think it is -- it is an incredibly youth will absolutely kind of drive the future and it will absolutely therefore drive a lot of economic future of iraq.

>> thank you do you have anything else to add in that? >> thanks very much. okay so -- let's go back to one of the, obviously, the broader things that was mentioned at the top. you know we've got the elections coming up. question to all of you really just to point of discussion. how different do you think harris administration or trump administration would view bilateral relations with iraq? start over here. >> we've seen both administrations. we've seen fourer years of form or president trump and we know u.s. iraq relations a lot and that term. we don't expect differences in the philosophy of mostly president trump will bring either the same people or similar like minded people to the foreign policy, and yeah.

there will be some changes that happen because fourer years have since president trump left office. so i think it will depending on whether people who will come to get the received the office from the current administration will admit that four years at best because we meet some people sometimes who served in iraq in 2009 or -- they still look for, you know, the same solutions that they presented then as if nothing happened between 2009 and now. we hope that there will be a fresh look at u.s. iraq relations. if trump wins. if -- vice president harris wins, then, i mean, she promised to maybe have her own administration crafted the way that she envisions this and we expect that to happen to a certain degree.

but you know, again, i think the depends again who will be continuing to serve and their president harris if she wins and who will come in as people -- i believe that there are many of the aspects of u.s. iraq relations transcend administrations because there are interests that are durability and problems with solutions for them need to be worked out without regard to who the administration will be. you know, and that's i think -- how the relation will be. i believe that not only we will have new administration and the united states. but by end of 2025 we'll have new administration as well. and most likely, you know, we will have to elect recalibrate that one as well, and relations

to the all of that. iraq will continue, i believe, to be important for washington. and i believe that the iraqis also will continue to recognize the importance of working with washington and trying to reconcile their differences as much as they can and build toward the future and what steve just mentioned area basically we need to move to the sectors that the strategic framework agreement have not been addressed to the ul fullest extent that was the agenda that prime minister soleimani brought with him when he came to the united states earlier this year. he didn't bring any person from the security sector by intention he left it to bilateral negotiations he brought with him people whorn who were interested in the trade and education and in the other fields economics, et cetera.

so that's a message from both administrations that they want to move in that direction. >> one area that we can expect some change is trump administration was presumed going to be a lot more -- even more on israel. especially when it comes to we can bring tony in on this one especially when it comes to trying to -- trying to mediate her response to iran. this, obviously, expecting strike any day now. and the biden administration has been quite, quite lax in terms of what it does present in terms of constraints to israel. however, there is been some pushing back we know under trump administration those constraints probably going to go away. so tony i know you don't want to talk about politics. but i wondered if yowgd address this one.

in terms of how -- further emboldened trump regime i see you roll your eyes might impact the broader region especially in terms of, you know, iran backed militia in iraq? >> yeah. i mean i'm not going to be able to make any comments on what a -- what a future u.s. administration might do differently than a current u.s. administration. anyway, so -- sorry if i can't help you out there. if i were to make some comments on this, it is the problem any administration is going to have is -- is figuring out how to intervene in a process where, you know, iran has lost much of its deterrence against israel so there's not a lot of incentive on israeli side.

to allow threats to -- to what they perceived as threats to remain what leverage we have whatever administration we have to -- to -- you know, to manage that. i don't know that we -- i don't know that we have a lot of leverage no matter who we are to do that at this time. that could change. but sorry i -- said earlier i can't really talk about differences between the administrations. >> do you see -- do you see this changing how the iran backed militia will impact civil society in iraq? >> how they're going to impact civil society? >> in terms of like, you know, on the potentially on even more emboldened netanyahu regime what would be -- >> there's a differentiation particularly among group that works on human rights and demock

are demock -- you know, they've read all of the literature about it they work actively for it. we can, you know, discuss the personal movement right now. and i think one thing that a lot of people in the west have missed about this group is that the u.s. has lost all moral lijts legitimacy among them and no longer the bearer of hule rights that once was for these groups to the extent that i've noticed diminished appetite for american and european funding. of course places like spain or belgium for example, but particularly the u.s., the u.k., germany have lost a lot of moral legitimacy within iraq and within civil society across the middle east. and i've known, you know, from the personal contact with civil society various activist who don't want to partner with the u.s. or any u.s. funded organizations -- and i think because of their genuine commitment to what human rights is they see the u.s. as a hypocrite for basically funding a genocide and palestine now

funding illegal invasion in lebanon. i think -- these iraqis are ones to have been raised with a vision of in a new iraq they're working towards and they've -- are now looking for defining that for themselves and looking forward it is a positive development because i think it is self-sustaining not reliant on outside support so i think that's positive in terms of the impact of arm groups in iraq on their activity, i mean they were preyed upon by different groups during the protest movement. but a good chunk of that was also because they were associated with the left so much so i think maybe breaking up this association will be beneficial for them. when you think about their -- you know, their security. essentially it is too early to tell right now. so we'll have to wait and see. but they have transformed fundamentally. >> thank you. >> it was a -- there was an distinct if you can

call it that week where israeli tv channel had a picture of a hispanic excuse me with a target on his face that seemed to be indicating that israel was, you know, going to start systemically targeting senior -- what was the reaction to that in iraq that you were tracking? >> i can specifically talk about the reaction of because i did get on the phone and discuss them when it happened. so i think he must have seen channel 14 they had a photo of various armed shiitte leaders they also had -- the new leader of hezbollah and they had one has been nothing but a figure of peace in a war torn area for 20 years and only way i can really reason this out is a, they just which is what some people have been saying

like leaders came up with that which is widely racist and b, they have actually -- declared a target the senior most scholar in the world and from another perspective this enraged they're very angry. i think u.s. ambassador in response to the anger because for the last since the isis war it has been working on trying to work on interfaith dialogue both within iraq and outside, outreach to scholars in the u.s. facilitating conference as these kinds of things and to be told that, you know, your leaders a target now of this broad like armed campaign against different figures of the middle east. what i really want to explain here is that it is not that and everyone around him is insult because israel thinks he's the enemy. i think there's a famous kind of that's about it. that i'm sure that's how they feel about it. but it's that they would have

the gulf actually targeting or saying they want to target such an important figure. this was a man who called for iraq to have its own constitutional elected by britain by elected people person who incentivize people to vote he was very much in on the democratic process in iraq. he called for desectorianization at the height of the civil war. so it's -- you know, it's akin for people to targeting the pope simply for being catholic. and that's how he feels about that in particular. i can't speak to the rest iraq with as much authority but i can assure you those in iraq a predominantly one feels this way and other iraqis who usually have a very positive view of hezbollah in iraq will share that image. >> your view is it a simple mistake by the production crew of channel 12 or 14 -- >> simple mistake when it is racist it is a racist mistake or it's, you know, israel is really --

pushing the line on everything. as it has done repeatedly in the last year. >> and -- steve mentioned some of the civil society groups take u.s. funding. and i was wondering if you've experienced -- we're hearing that -- from the iraqis they want more u.s. investment. what are some of the challenges that you're perceiving in terms of getting more u.s. and western investment into iraq? >> very good question. and one thing i just would mention, you know -- i think when going back to original question the difference between harris and trump administration i did want to mention and it came up on i think the first panel was the focus that the prime minister in iraq has had on methane em baitment with goal of ending by 2030 that's one goal that the u.s. business community has been active in a number of projects

to capture the gas converted to gas electricity and it helps with the budget and other issues so i think that's one that we would be worried about if the election were to go one way because we think that's important progress also on the health front. for iraqi citizens. now, yes, there are a raft of issues that presented challenges to more u.s. commercial participation investment, and they range from, you know, just over the security concerns like we talked about. to a number of, you know, regulatory -- granular things from different custom standards. you know, we've seen essentially kind of legacy or anti-waited stands for certain products that haven't been updated to reflect innovation. and certain product, you know, so companies have found it impossible to, you know, bring, you know, new type of products

that we suspect and rocky customers would relish to be able to purchase. so there's those types of very granular specific things. you know corruption was mentioned as one of the key issues and rule of law by the past panel. and i think those are two overarching things and the progress is being made on the banking system and bringing it into the international standards, and best practices is important, and tied with that, you know, is the effort to try to digitize and move things away from, you know, what signatures, you know, to, you know, that kind of the e -- e economy i think that's a way number one to bring iraq's economy forward in the modern global economy and it is also a way to indirectly combat corruption at the end of the day, but those -- that's big overarching challenges definitely things that -- that have been more granular in

sector specific. >> so under trump administration you would expect to less less informsment in i think used the example of me saying abatement to deal with a problem of gas flairing. >> if you look at the time and pulled out of the paris accords -- you know, and that was basically said everything that needed to be set on that. now i think where the business community at it sees a very important commercial opportunity. and meeting a need in iraq. you know, so the question would be would there be u.s. financial support through the dfc and other -- you know, other entities like that under trump administration that would be a huge question mark. you know, with the administration put money into that. but regardless i think the business community, you know, sees that it is important i think the iraqi government, you know, understands that it is important, and it's in error that we would want to continue to work on regardless of who wins in november. and again i think that comes back to, you know, the elections

in iraq will probably be more consequential ultimately for u.s. business participation in the iraqi economy. >> and be on the investment be on the -- be on the energy sector what are some of the other areas investment that u.s. could be getting more involved in? >> we've -- we've taken a couple of what we call farm and fort delegations actually to the region, and you know we're looking at everything from bringing companies that sell and that produce and sell seeds. and you know, the farm commitment, you know, to the irrigation, all the way through processing, you know, produce and the yields from the fields. you know, to the table -- and to the franchise opportunities. so that is, i think, a huge area and it's an area where there's a lot of u.s. expertise in water management irrigation, and producing seeds that are climate resistant and can grow with very

little water. you know, so bringing that type of technology and making that available in iraq and in a bigger way, i think can have a really dynamic effect on agriculture for example, so that's one area. you know, health care is another area. interestingly, you know, i think companies or people would be shocked to know that we have more health care companies on our iraq council than we do energy companies and again i think it is one of those untold stories, you know, you have -- whether they're medical device -- you know whether they're pharmaceutical, you know, whenever they're at in the ecosystem not just business with government of iraq but business with the iraqi private sector and health care community. and again, that's a huge area of opportunity, you know, to bring iraq i would say and to the international best standards and practices to deliver the best patient outcomes. you know, for iraqi citizens. so that's another big area that we are focused on and then one

other that i would mention is just financial services and banking. again, you know, that has complications across the whole economy so it's important for reforms underway to continue in iraq and to align with international, you know, standards and best practices -- and then that can fuel investment and commercial activity in a whole host of other areas. >> thank you. and i would like to remind viewer that anyone can ask a question any time it is ask ac.org and i'll receive a question here on the ipad. general question for everyone actually what's in terms of keeping to the topic of the discussion today. what start with you. what's the biggest -- challenge and biggest opportunity for u.s./iraq relations over the next 12 months? >> change of administration is a big thing because now if -- as i said the question here is -- where would the u.s. policy be in the region?

certainly iraq is an important piece of that. so that will be important and i believe that we have this relation that needs to be -- to be sorted out depends on which philosophy will be taking over the white house. there will also be the question of the impliation of the immigration of the troops but that all -- if, you know, nothing really drastic happens which will hope nothing happens in the -- in the general middle east conflict right now that the situation takes a downturn and then iraq is dragged into it. then a lot of the -- what we have been working on will be completely up in the air. because you know, if there's some especially if there's some decision to target iraq by israel then certainly the iraqi

government will not be able to control some of the groups that are right now they're engaged on a smaller scale but it can be -- it can be on a bigger scale. and if there is some perceived u.s. involvement in a way because this is not me talking. it is how iraqis are thinking. you know, the united states is in charge of the air defense of iraq, for example, the united states is the country that is in control through the coalition, and through its troops. so israelis work to target iraq they'll have to go through the u.s. and it will be interpreted as a grand light from the united states then. and the rhetoric and narratives that are in iraq right now this happens and u.s. target will be fair game. u.s. interests -- you know, you're talk about troops whether it is the embassy. or interest companies, maybe. that would be a huge challenge. we hope we will not get there

and that's why i said earlier in the program -- we are close if the current efforts that are being undertaken by the europeans and by the united states fail and cannot contain this conflict and nobody really knows where the, you know, you could start the war or probably control if elements of the factor of the war but nobody can tell where it will catch, and you know, i don't see many same people who are -- you know, in this conflict. so the question here is, you know can it be expanding in a dangerous way, yes and to now we have seen limited role by iran, and we have seen limited role by iraq. but if it really catches the region by, you know, the certain targets that are deemed unacceptable to, you know, crossing certain right right lad

lines that might turn in a fast way into a year. a different game of together. that would be the -- the worst scenario from a u.s. iraq foreign relations perspective. but you know, again we are still optimistic on hoping this will not happen and there is, you know, the conferences that are being planned will -- will bring some good fruits. then what we talk about is just a classic challenges that are working on in the past, you know, few years since the -- you know, the we started having, you know, i mean, mending fences between iraq and the united states. it's pushing how to work the troops with a schedule allowed to deal with the trying to establish business relations. those issues, but you know, so probably i would really focus on

that sort of -- conflict will be bad or will be contained. that would be the one thing that american foreign policy makers have to cope their eyes on. >> thank you. timing actually if we can bring you again on the same question so looking forward to the next 12 months the biggest challenges and potential opportunities that you see. and u.s. iraq relationship. >> yeah. no it is a great question. i was recently in a conversation to ambassador of the united states who said something similar he said this is in context of the iraq engagement program and you have to stop looking at iraq as a problem but as an opportunity. and that may actually be as a lot of folks who they've pointed out that may be the biggest challenge is finding those opportunities that get beyond security -- security cooperations. but right now our biggest window in security cooperation and this