The governing council on 10 September appointed Sinan Mohammed Rida al-Shibibi as the country’s first central bank governor since the removal of Saddam Hussein. Al-Shibibi’s immediate priority is to develop new monetary policies ahead of the reconstruction donors’ conference in Madrid on 23-24 October.

Al-Shibibi is a career economist who worked in Iraq’s Planning Ministry until 1980 when he joined the Geneva-based UN Conference on Trade & Development (UNCTAD). He retired in 2001, but continued to work for UNCTAD as a consultant. Al-Shibibi received a master’s degree in economics from the UK’s Manchester University in 1972 and, in 1975, gained a doctorate in economics from Bristol University, also in the UK.