The killing in Iraq of three Lebanese businesspeople, including a married couple, and the wounding of another, as well as further kidnappings of Lebanese since then, have dealt more serious blows to already faltering Lebanon-Iraq trade.
Initial business optimism generated by the quick fall of the former Iraqi regime has been replaced by uncertainty as the security situation in Iraq fails to improve. In recent months, a number of Lebanese businessmen and truck drivers have been kidnapped. According to the satellite television station Al-Jazeera, a statement on the Internet signed by a militant Iraqi group threatened to “slaughter any Lebanese working with the US Army and drag their bodies through the streets of Iraq.” Hundreds of Lebanese have flocked to Iraq over the last 15-16 months, in a quest to cash in on the massive postwar reconstruction effort.
“If there wasn’t so much money to be made in Iraq, we would already have stopped sending people there,” acknowledged Elie Shamsy, a manager of Beirut Cargo Center, which transports goods to Iraq. However, the company has stopped using Lebanese drivers. “We only use Syrians and Iraqis,” said Shamsy, “because they appear to be targeted less.”
But it is in Iraq, asserted Lebanese Industrialists’ Association head Fadi Abboud, that the time-honored determination of Lebanese industrialists has become again apparent. Despite the dangers, he noted, scores of Lebanese businesspeople remain in the country, and others continue heading there. “Iraqi importers who ask for half a million dollars of cement from Lebanese firms can’t provide security. People don’t want to send employees to Iraq. We’re finding it difficult to insure. But the Lebanese will not stop doing business with Iraq. Lebanese businesspeople have historically overcome hardship. They embody the SAS (British commandos) motto: ‘Who dares, wins.’”
