EghtesadOnline: Despite the Interior Ministry’s announcement last week that Parvizkhan border crossing in the western Kermanshah Province will be reopened within 48 hours, this frontier with Iraq’s Kurdish region remains closed, the head of Kermanshah Chamber of Commerce, Industries, Mines and Agriculture said.

EghtesadOnline: A referendum on independence in Iraq’s semi-autonomous and oil-rich Kurdish region should not take place in September as planned because it would be destabilizing at time when the fight against Islamic State isn’t yet won, the U.S. envoy to the coalition confronting the extremist group said.