Iraq's Corruption
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The Record

Timeline

This page lists the dated events on the site from 2003 to 2026, in the order in which they happened. Each event comes from one of the site's datasets and leads to its record: the start of a case, a sanction or a ban, a rule issued by the Central Bank, or a change in the legal status of a person or a company.

Each date is given only as precisely as the source gives it. It may be a day, a month or only a year.

The timeline holds 362 dated events: 98 case beginnings, 48 sanctions and enforcement actions, 82 Central Bank rules, 132 changes in the legal status of people and companies and 2 on how the new financial system was set up.

Kind of event
All 178Cases 35Sanctions and enforcement 32Central Bank rules 21Changes in legal status 90
Period
All years 98From 2003 to 2009 31From 2010 to 2019 32From 2020 to 2026 35

2020

  1. 2020Case begins
    Iranian oil passed off as Iraqi: Salim Ahmed Said and Waleed al-Samarra'i networks (US designations, 2025)
  2. 2020Case begins
    Kurdistan Region: 16,500 double-salary earners removed (2020) and UN monitoring of grand-corruption trials (from 2024 to 2025)
  3. June 2020Case begins
    Bribery and fake-produce racket at Iraqi Grain Board wheat-collection silos
  4. August 2020Case begins
    Committee 29 ("Abu Ragheef committee"): PM Kadhimi's special anti-corruption committee (from 2020 to 2022)
  5. November 2020Case begins
    Raad al-Haris: former deputy electricity minister and PM adviser convicted of bribery (2022)

2021

  1. April 2021Case begins
    COVID-ward fires at Ibn al-Khatib (Baghdad, April 2021) and al-Hussein (Nasiriyah, July 2021) hospitals: negligence and corruption
  2. September 2021Case begins
    "Theft of the Century": about IQD 3.8 trillion (about $2.5bn) withdrawn from the General Commission for Taxes trust deposits at Rafidain Bank (from 2021 to 2022)
  3. October 2021Case begins
    Sabah al-Kinani, civil-society head and parliamentary candidate: caught, according to the Integrity Commission, taking $30,000 from a director-general (2021)

2022

  1. 2022Case begins
    Zubair oilfield pipeline-tapping ring and arrest of oil-protection police generals (Basra, 2022)
  2. 2022Case begins
    Central Electricity Distribution Company: seven-year illicit-enrichment sentence for a former director general and a three-year sentence for its finance director (2026)
  3. January 2022Case begins
    Shakir Al Zamili: former head of Baghdad's Investment Commission jailed over the Baghdad Star housing project (2022)
  4. November 2022Case begins
    US-driven dollar restrictions and Central Bank bans on Iraqi banks (from 2022 to 2026)
  5. November 2022Case begins
    Subsidised fuel oil diverted via asphalt plants and smuggled through Basra (from 2022 to 2024)

2023

  1. 2023Case begins
    Travellers' dollars: abuse of the official-rate cash allowance for travellers and Central Bank counter-measures (from 2023 to 2024)
  2. 2023Case begins
    Recovering assets abroad: Iraq's record from 2023 to 2026 (41 requests for mutual legal assistance; about $17.4m recovered in 2025)
  3. January 2023Case begins
    Card-based dollar arbitrage: Iraqi prepaid and debit cards on the Visa and Mastercard networks (from 2023 to 2025)
  4. February 2023Case begins
    Muhandis General Company: US designation for diverting Iraqi government contract funds to Kata'ib Hizballah (2025)
  5. April 2023Case begins
    Kurdistan Region crude trucked to Iran outside official channels during the pipeline shutdown (from 2023 to 2025)
  6. July 2023Case begins
    Al-Taif Islamic Bank placed under Central Bank of Iraq guardianship over undisclosed violations (2026)

2024

  1. January 2024Case begins
    Al-Huda Bank: FinCEN Section 311 finding and OFAC designation of its owner (2024)
  2. January 2024Case begins
    Fly Baghdad: OFAC terrorism-finance sanctions (2024) and 2026 delisting of the airline
  3. January 2024Case begins
    Muhammad Hanash Mahmoud Daki: illicit-enrichment conviction, Trebil border-crossing customs (2024)
  4. January 2024Case begins
    US civil lawsuit against Kurdistan Region leaders (Revend et al. v. Barzani et al., D.D.C. No. 1:24-cv-00278), 2024
  5. February 2024Case begins
    Basra Governor Asaad al-Eidani: parliamentary probe into land allocation and financial mismanagement (from 2024 to 2025)
  6. March 2024Case begins
    Members of parliament and a senior adviser: sentences, warrants and arrests (from 2024 to 2026)
  7. September 2024Case begins
    Head of the Integrity Commission, Haider Hanoun: leaked recordings, a Maysan land plot and an arrest order (2024)
  8. October 2024Case begins
    Audio leak attributed to PM adviser Abdel Karim al-Faisal complaining a bribe was "only $1 million" (Nov 2024)

2025

  1. October 2025Case begins
    Cancellation of the $764m Baghdad International Airport redevelopment contract over corruption concerns (2026)

2026

  1. January 2026Case begins
    Baqubah Municipality land-allocation fraud: in-absentia conviction of Saad Nasr Alwan (2026)
  2. May 2026Case begins
    Deputy Oil Minister for Refining Adnan al-Jumaili: arrest and seizure of about $107m in cash, gold and property (2026)
  3. June 2026Case begins
    Green Zone anti-corruption raids: 47 officials arrested including 13 MPs and a deputy oil minister (28 to 29 June 2026)
  4. July 2026Case begins
    Illicit-enrichment and bribery convictions of MPs and senior officials after the 2026 crackdown
  5. July 2026Case begins
    Rafidain Bank Diwaniyah branch banknote-swap embezzlement (2026)
  6. August 2026Case begins
    Khalid Ghazay Atiya: Ministry of Electricity official arrested with millions in cash and gold (2026)
  7. August 2026Case begins
    Ammar Jabr Khalil Abd al-Hamid: former Salah al-Din governor convicted in absentia of illicit enrichment (2026)
Download:timeline.csv.xlsxrules_timeline.csv.xlsxenforcement.csv.xlsx