The latest corruption news from Iraq – company or government bribes, theft, stealing – brought to you by Iraq Business News
The U.S. government has filed a civil lawsuit accusing KBR and its Kuwaiti subcontractor of submitting nearly $50 million in inflated claims to install live-in trailers for troops during the Iraq War. It is alleged that KBR and First Kuwaiti Trading Co. overcharged for truck, driver and crane costs, and misrepresented delays in providing around […]
By John Lee. The Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction (SIGIR) has reported that U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) did not establish effective internal controls to document that goods and services paid for using DFI funds were received in Iraq. SIGIR sampled 12 DFI-funded payments, totaling about $1.1 billion, made to USACE and found that […]
By John Lee. Iraq's Interior Ministry says its forces have stormed Central Bank building in Baghdad and arrested 36 officials on suspicion of corruption. “A security force belonging to the ministry implemented an arrest warrant issued by the judicial council against a numerous officials of the Central Bank without any problem,” the ministry said in […]
Perhaps the biggest story of recent days was the shock dismissal of the Governor of the Central Bank of Iraq (CBI), Sinan al-Shabibi, and the issuing of arrest warrants for him and many of his staff. The nature of the allegations against Mr Shabibi are not entirely clear, but appear to center around manipulation of […]
By Saleem al-Wazzan. This article was originally published by Niqash. Any opinions expressed are those of the author, and do not necessarily reflect the views of Iraq Business News. The number of squatters in Basra is growing by the day and tens of thousands live in local shanty towns. The settlements are impeding development projects […]
By Mohammed Hamid al-Sawaf. This article was originally published by Niqash. Any opinions expressed are those of the author, and do not necessarily reflect the views of Iraq Business News. Unofficial money changers are common in Iraq – and trade is particularly brisk in the tourist town of Karbala. But recently a gang of fraudsters […]
By John Lee. A spokesman from the parliamentary oil and gas committee has said that $27 billion has been spent on the electricity sector in Iraq since 2003, and that vast amounts of money have been wasted through corruption. According to AKnews, Qasim Mohammed said: "Iraqi Deputy Prime Minister for Energy Hussain Shahristani will be […]
By John Lee. The former managing director of Australian wheat exporter AWB has been fined 100,000 Australian dollars ($106,000) and banned from being a company director for two years for his role in paying kickbacks to Iraq's former dictatorship under the discredited UN oil-for-food program. According to the Sydney Morning Herald, the breaches related to […]
By John Lee. In the first half of this year, Iraq's courts have issued 754 judgments in cases dealing with corruption and fraud involving public money, claims the Commission on Integrity. The cases, referred to the courts by the Commission, resulted in 816 convictions. In some cases, those convicted will remain in jail following completion […]
By John Lee. Halliburton has begun internal investigations into alleged payments made to third-party agents related to customs matters in Angola and Iraq. Bloomberg reports that the world’s second- largest oilfield services provider alerted U.S. Justice Department and Securities and Exchange officials that it had begun the inquiry after meeting with them about another internal […]
By Shalaw Mohammed. This article was originally published by Niqash. Any opinions expressed are those of the author, and do not necessarily reflect the views of Iraq Business News. Oil smuggling is virtually a tradition in the oil-producing areas of Iraq. And local authorities are trying to prevent it. But, as this tale of oil […]
By John Lee. The Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction (SIGIR), Stuart Bowen (pictured), has found serious weaknesses in the government’s controls over Iraq reconstruction funds that put billions of American taxpayer dollars at risk of waste and misappropriation. The precise amount lost to fraud and waste can never be known, but SIGIR believes it […]
