Iraq
Iraqis walk past the Central Bank of Iraq's headquarters on Rashid Street in the Baghdad on December 22, 2020. Photo: AFP
ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - A Baghdad court issued an order on Tuesday to re-arrest the main suspect in the massive theft of $2.5 billion from the country’s tax coffers, dubbed the “Heist of the Century,” nearly two years after he was released on bail.
An investigation by the Iraqi finance ministry in October 2022 concluded that over $2.5 billion (3.7 trillion dinars) in tax funds were stolen from a bank by five companies during the tenure of former Finance Minister Ali Allawi.
Mustafa Sanad, an independent Shiite MP, announced on Tuesday that Baghdad’s anti-corruption criminal court had issued an arrest warrant for Noor Zuhair Jassim, the primary suspect. The court has granted Jassim’s bail bondsmen until September 9 to bring the suspect to court.
The suspect was set to appear before court in mid-August, but the session was postponed due to Jassim’s absence. He was not present at Tuesday’s session either.
Jassim, the managing director of an oil services company, was arrested by security forces in late October 2022, as he was attempting to flee the country through Baghdad International Airport.
Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shia’ al-Sudani said in November 2022 that Jassim admitted to embezzling a sum of 1.618 trillion dinars (over $1.1 billion), and was to be released on bail to facilitate the payment of the remaining funds within two weeks.
The government has announced it has recovered some of the funds; however, the majority remains missing.
Haider Hanoun, head of the Iraqi integrity commission, told Iraqi state media on Tuesday that Jassim was released in accordance with the provisions of the Criminal Procedure Code, after he expressed his willingness to return the money he had been accused of embezzling.
“The reason the court accepted what the suspect offered in the financial settlement was that there was no legal obstacle preventing that,” Hanoun explained, “in addition to the fact that obtaining the stolen amounts of money after issuing final rulings requires lengthy procedures from the enforcement departments to sell the properties through auctions, which may take a long time.”
In an interview with Iraqi media earlier this month, Jassim claimed that the money he has been accused of stealing was not from the state’s coffers, while vowing to release the names of all those involved if he were to be prosecuted.
Another arrest warrant was issued on Tuesday for Haitham al-Jabouri, the former head of the parliamentary finance committee. Jabouri was arrested for his involvement in the case in November 2022, but he was released on bail in early 2023.
Rampant corruption plagues all levels of the Iraqi state. The crisis-hit country ranks 154 out of 180 countries in the global anti-corruption watchdog Transparency International's corruption perceptions index.
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