Iraq PM on a potential weapons tax

Haydar Hadi | Anadolu Agency | Getty Images

Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi delivers a speech during Baghdad Dialogue Conference in Baghdad, Iraq on January 14, 2017.

Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi said that spending on reconstruction — not arms — was necessary for peace.

Discussing the amount of money spent on conflict in the Middle East, “this is not good for us,” Al-Abadi said. “We cannot build our nations with a lot of arms,” he added.

Al-Abadi was speaking to CNBC Sunday on the sidelines of the 2018 Munich Security Conference in Germany, attended by politicians from Europe, the U.S. and the Middle East among others, as well as leaders from NGOs and private companies. Iraq received pledges of $30 billion from allies this week, though this was less than its propositioned $88 billion to recover from years of conflict.

Al-Abadi said that he had not met with any arms manufacturers at the conference, but instead had been in talks with civil manufacturing companies.

This is a “good sign that there is now an understanding that without rebuilding, reconstruction, peace and security cannot be achieved – I think this should be the slogan,” he said.