BAGHDAD (AP) — Iraq’s government said Sunday it will allocate part of the $2. 5 billion budget embezzled from the country’s fiscal management in a grand scheme involving a network of corporations and officials.
About 182 billion Iraqi dinars, or $125 million, of the stolen sum will be recovered by seizing assets and assets belonging to a well-connected businessman complicit in the corruption scheme, Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani said in a statement.
The recovered amount was paid to Noor Zuhair Jassim, a businessman who was arrested as part of the scheme with government tax officials for taking the flight budget from a tax deposit account between September 2021 and August 2022.
Al-Sudani under pressure that the ongoing investigation would spare no one involved in the scheme, and that the government is running with the full amount stolen.
Jassim confessed to having the sum embezzled, he added. He deserves to be released on bail. His legal representation did not respond to calls from the Palestinian Authority. Al-Sudani also said the investigation was ongoing and he knew of others involved.
Jassim arrested at Baghdad International Airport in late October. He appointed chief executive of two of the five shell corporations through which the budget was stolen. According to an internal audit reported through The Associated Press, Jassim received more than a billion dollars from the account. .
Officials say it is that a scheme of misappropriation of this magnitude can take a stand without the knowledge of superiors.
Political factions in Iraq have long competed for ministries and other government agencies, which they use to provide jobs and other favors to their supporters. Several factions are connected to other government agencies involved in the tax system.
The existing government met in late October, more than a year after the snap elections.
As leaders take credit for the glow of short-term gains, most of which come from Russia’s war on Ukraine, the oil industry faces the same demanding long-term situations that have threatened its long-term in recent years.