An Iraqi-Emirati consortium plans a $700 million subsea-and-terrestrial data cable linking the United Arab Emirates to Türkiye via Iraq, one of the backers said, just over a week after the announcement of a Saudi-backed fibre-optic project in Syria.

Saudi Arabia and the UAE are racing to tap into the region's demand for connectivity and attract investment into data centres.

The Iraqi-UAE project, branded WorldLink, would comprise an undersea cable from Fujairah in the UAE to Iraq's Faw peninsula on the Gulf, which will then run overland north to the Turkish border, Ali El Ekabi, head of Iraq's Tech 964 – one of the three members of the consortium – told Reuters.

El Ekabi said the project would be privately funded, take four to five years to complete, and target "hyperscalers, international carriers, and AI applications".

It aims to ease congestion on existing east-west data routes and reduce transit times versus paths that run through the Suez Canal.

Saudi Arabia and Syria announced on February 7 plans to set up a fibre-optic network under a wider investment package.

The project was described as a roughly $1 billion push to rehabilitate Syria's infrastructure and position it as a data route between Asia and Europe.

Besides Tech 964, WorldLink's sponsors include DIL Technologies and UAE-based Breeze Investments, according to El Ekabi, who is the son of Iraqi real estate billionaire Namir El Ekabi.