On Monday last week, Iraq sold $2.8 billion in government bonds, with JP Morgan as one of the lead underwriters.

Due in 2028, the bonds are yielding about 9.25%...temporarily at least, some folks in the the bond market are perceiving this bond issue as being an "implied obligation" of the US government. Not a bet I would take.

I know very little about emerging markets bonds, but I understand just a little something about country risk.
And there is nutty pricing on this Iraqi issue, imho. You can buy "risk free" 10-year US Treasury bonds right now that are yielding about 4.5%, or you can buy 9.25% bonds from an Iraqi govt that may or may not be around in two years from now, let alone 10, let alone in 2028.

I was recently involved in a deal where we lent money at about 20% interest to a successful residential condo developer with a long track record...and I say that lending money to that developer is 1/10th as risky as buying the Iraq government bonds, but that loan is paying 2X the interest of the Iraq bond. Crazy.

If it was easy to short the Iraqi bonds for an individual investor like me, I would do it all day long.