ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - The Iraqi parliament demanded on Thursday that the government open investigations into major corruption files, following a decision to lift parliamentary immunity for several lawmakers, a move aimed at holding corruption suspects accountable, as part of an ongoing crackdown launched late last week.
"For many years, the scourge of corruption has been eating away at the foundations of our state, until it became the greatest challenge facing the political system," the legislature said in a statement, urging the incumbent government led by Iraqi Prime Minister Ali al-Zaidi to press ahead with its Operation Dawn campaign, "opening the largest, most dangerous, and most financially damaging corruption cases within specified timeframes.”
Zaidi ordered the large-scale anti-corruption campaign on Sunday, currently taking place in coordination with Iraq's Federal Commission of Integrity. The operation has so far netted dozens of Iraqi politicians and government employees, along with tens of millions of dollars in stolen assets.
The Iraqi parliament said Thursday that its "national decision" to lift parliamentary immunity from a number of lawmakers "paved the way for this effort."
The legislature further listed seven corruption files it said need to be prioritized. These include tax fraud, energy sector power plant contracts, investment licensing irregularities, housing and reconstruction project inflation, health sector and medicine import corruption, transport sector port and railway contracts, and fraudulent arms procurement deals in the defense and interior ministries.
"In exercising its oversight authority," the Iraqi parliament said it "will provide the relevant anti-corruption bodies with all information in its possession regarding the aforementioned cases," and "will also monitor the measures taken" to "ensure that justice is served, looted public funds are protected and recovered to the state treasury in accordance with the [Iraqi] constitution and applicable laws."
The statement by the council of representatives comes a day after Munir Haddad, a renowned Iraqi judge and legal advisor to Prime Minister Zaidi, said Wednesday that over $2 trillion have been looted from Iraq since 2003.
"There are no final figures on the number of those detained [in Operation Dawn] so far, as the figure continues to rise due to ongoing daily raids," Haddad noted, further explaining that the efforts are currently being conducted under strict secrecy as "some wanted individuals had attempted to evade arrest by fleeing Iraq or seeking refuge in the Kurdistan Region," underscoring that Erbil instead "cooperated by handing over eight suspects so far."
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