Country profile: Iraq
)
So much of the connectivity and digital infrastructure development in the Eurasian region centres on providing route diversity to help avoid and derisk the Suez Canal and Red Sea chokepoint, relied upon by over 80% of all Asian, Middle Eastern and East African traffic.
This need to diversify has led to increased attention on what Iraq has to offer as a digital hub. The country is part of the only currently feasible land-based route between Europe and the Middle East, and this offers potential for wider development in the country, including hyperscaler involvement and data centre construction to take advantage of lower latency and less route congestion, and new routes to further diversify traffic options. A long period of stability of government is also helping matters here, ith the country’s administration in a position to develop longer-term strategies and provide more predictable conditions for more outside investment.
There is also a wider effort underway to digitally transform the country and bolster its internal connectivity infrastructure. Vodafone announced in December 2024 that it would assist the Iraqi government in establishing a new government-owned 5G mobile operator, a move that will help to improve general digital performance in the country, where mobile speeds are behind other markets in the region.
-
"Iraq offers a lot of advantages. It sits between Syria and Iran with direct terrestrial routes between the GCC and Turkey. That makes it a natural bridge between the Middle East and Europe. “Everyone needs to manage risk. They need to be able to reroute around issues and optimise connectivity to deliver low-latency options. This is where Iraq fits in. Iraq’s digital corridor reduces the dependency on congested subsea cable pathways and improves performance for latency-sensitive workloads. This is particularly important for AI, cloud computing, and real-time applications. “Over the next decade, we’ll see Iraq become a global transit hub for connectivity. The rise of AI will continue, and so will the demand for diverse, low-latency routes. “Iraq will no longer be seen as just an alternative. It will be the preferred and viable route for many global networks. The organisations that move early will be best positioned to monetise this shift and gain rapid access to Iraq’s digital future"