A full chronological account, with every claim linked to the document that establishes it.
Companies contracting with the Iraqi state prepay part of their taxes as security deposits held in trust by the General Commission for Taxes (GCT). Refunds of the surplus require a demanding, multi-step process. By 2021, these trust accounts held trillions of dinars.
After a fraud attempt in 2017, the Prime Minister's Office required the Board of Supreme Audit to pre-audit every tax deposit refund. For four years, this single control stood between the trust accounts and organised theft.
In six weeks, a coordinated chain of letters — from the head of the Parliamentary Finance Committee, an ambiguously worded Prime Minister's Office reply, and the GCT's own leadership — removed the Board of Supreme Audit from the refund process. The GCT's director general ordered the removal internally before any minister had approved anything.
The first version of the scheme forged refund claims in the names of real multinationals — China Petroleum (CPECC) and Lukoil — using a forged power of attorney. Alert bank employees blocked it.
The scheme adapted: transfer the "refund right" of a multinational to a local company. On 9 September 2021, cheque No. 23253 — IQD 44,133,732,000, the exact amount of the cancelled CPECC cheque — was deposited to al-Qanit General Contracting and cashed. The theft had begun.
The final form of the scheme abandoned even the pretence of paperwork. For eleven months, cheques were written to five shell companies with no files, no records, no entries in the GCT's books — and cashed within days.
Acting on an informal tip, the Minister of Finance confronted the heads of the GCT and Rafidain Bank, demanded the paper trail, and on 4 November 2021 banned all refunds without his personal approval. The ban was hidden and ignored inside the GCT.
From November 2021 to August 2022 the theft ran on. The bank's anti-money-laundering department raised repeated internal alarms; the Central Bank did nothing; no statement reconciliations surfaced; nobody told the Minister.
After Dr Ali Allawi resigned, rumours stirred. The acting finance minister asked the former minister's advisor to investigate. The GCT's books were clean; the bank statements were not. On 24–25 September 2022 the missing trillions surfaced.
In two weeks of clandestine work, the advisor matched cheques and clearing records to five companies, while Parliament moved to strip the acting minister's powers. The report was signed on the evening of 9–10 October — one day before the vote.
The scandal exploded. Nour Zuhair was arrested trying to leave Iraq; part of the money was recovered and displayed; then, under a new government, he was released on a settlement, sentenced in absentia, covered by an amnesty — and remains free outside Iraq.
After the change of government, the machinery of accountability turned not on the scheme's protectors but on those who exposed it. Charges against the former minister collapsed when evidence was demanded; the masterminds' protectors were never touched; no banker was ever charged.