ERBIL, Kurdistan - Iraq completed its payment of war reparations worth $52.4 billion to Kuwait, the United Nations Compensation Commission (UNCC) said on Wednesday.
The recipients of the reparations payment were individuals, companies, and governments who could prove that they incurred damages due to the 1990 Iraqi invasion of Kuwait.
The UNCC was set up in 1991 by the UN Security Council in the aftermath of the seven-month occupation of Kuwait by former Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein.
The reparations body raised the money through a tax on Iraqi oil sales over the last 31 years. The percentage was originally set at 30 percent and was reduced over the years, most recently to 3 percent.
The UNCC received around 2.7 million claims at the time, valued at $352.5 billion, but approved the amount of $52.4, according to a UN press release. The report by the body added that the final payment was made on January 13, but the last report in Geneva by the UNCC was officially filed on Wednesday.
The UNCC declared at the session held on Wednesday that the Iraqi government had “fulfilled its international obligations” to compensate Kuwait.
Iraq in 2014 halted payments to Kuwait due to the war against Islamic State (ISIS) only to resume four years later in 2018.
The completion of the reparation payments come at an economically crucial time for Iraq, given the current political uncertainty and ongoing demonstrations demanding an improvement in public services.
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