TALKING ABOUT $2 BILLION MISSING AND A CATASTROPHIC SITUATION, A DEPUTY CONFIRMS THE CONTINUED SMUGGLING OF DOLLARS THROUGH “NEW METHODS.
Parliamentarian and member of the parliamentary economic committee, Sipan Shirwani, confirmed that billions of dollars are lost in government bank accounts, pointing to “a new way to smuggle US currency to sanctioned countries.”
“According to the reviews we conducted on the banks in the past period, we found a catastrophic situation in which Iraqi banks are operating, including those affiliated with the Ministry of Finance,” Sherwani said in an exclusive interview with Al-Jabal platform on Thursday. “When you look at the expenditures, you find billions of dollars in corruption cases,” he added, noting that “the numbers are beyond the range of expectations, and there is no oversight of these amounts.”
Sherwani stated that “in one case at the Trade Bank of Iraq (TBI), two billion dollars are missing, and in another case, two trillion dinars were given as loans to the people, and nothing was returned. This reflects negligence on the part of the bank itself and the Ministry of Finance.” He pointed out that “if there was no collusion between these parties, there is certainly a reason for the failure to return these funds. This proves the failure of the bank and the authorities responsible for managing the people’s money.”
At the same time, Shirwani added, “The smuggling of dollars abroad is continuing, and smugglers have found a way to smuggle the currency to neighboring countries and from neighboring countries to countries subject to US sanctions,” stressing that “this is documented.”
The parliamentarian said, “We see astronomical amounts of Iraq’s financial resources being squandered, left unattended, and these sums are public funds deposited by the ministry in these banks for citizens to benefit from in various projects.” He added, “These funds are being given to specific entities without revealing the identity or private information of those entities, and they are not returned.”
According to Sherwani, “There are banks that have lost an estimated two billion US dollars due to non-performing loans, and in other banks, the amount of lost funds has reached one billion dollars, or trillions of Iraqi dinars,” indicating that they “were granted to private entities, individuals, and companies.”
The MP had previously held a press conference at the Parliament’s press center regarding the “failure of the Ministry of Finance and government banks to manage state funds.” He said that “in the absence of accurate oversight, billions of dollars have been lost in government banks without any real accountability, which raises questions about the management of these financial institutions.” He pointed out that “Rafidain Bank has not been audited for more than nine years, in clear violation of transparency and accountability standards.”
He added that “TBAB has not been audited for four years, despite the volume of financial transactions it conducts,” stressing that “there are two trillion dinars in unrecovered loans at the bank, which constitutes a continuous financial drain. Financial obligations are converted from dinars to dollars, then sent to other countries and then smuggled to countries subject to sanctions. What raises suspicions about dollar smuggling operations is the disappearance of two billion dollars when it was received from Hamdia Al-Jaf at TBI.”
Sherwani pointed out that “TBI’s smart cards are ineffective outside Iraq, which requires an official explanation for this disruption. Obtaining loan funds in dinars instead of dollars leads to price differences of up to 10% between the official rate and the parallel rate, causing losses to the state treasury.”
To protect public funds and recover defaulted loans, the MP confirmed, “We contacted the Ministry of Finance and the relevant banks to obtain the required data, but TBI Bank refused to provide us with the information under the pretext of account confidentiality, ignoring its responsibility to protect citizens’ funds instead of covering up suspicions of corruption. The Ministry of Finance and Rafidain Bank refrained from responding to our official communications despite repeated confirmations.” He stressed, “Based on this, and in accordance with Law No. 15 of the Council of Representatives and its formations, we will resort to the necessary legal measures and refer the entire file to the Integrity Commission, the Financial Supervision Bureau, the judiciary, and the Public Prosecution to ensure accountability and recover state funds.”
