In the Kurdish capital of Irbil, a new world of luxury stores, hotels and restaurants has emerged due to Turkish investment.

The Kurdish region was one of the poorest in Iraq, but in the past five years tens of billions of dollars have been
invested there.

There are more than 1,000 Turkish companies registered, and Turkish construction workers are changing Irbil's skyline using an estimated 30,000 Turkish labourers from its own economically depressed Kurdish areas.

This leads many to believe that Turkey's closer relationship with Iraq is not only political, but economic.

Al Jazeera's Jane Arraf reports from Irbil, Iraq