Integrity Commission announces arrest of nine individuals for bribery

MOSUL, December 29 — Iraq’s Integrity Commission announced on Friday the arrest of nine individuals for their role in bribery cases tied to the intelligence, municipal, and water departments in Nineveh governorate.

The Commission released a statement, which read:

The Commission’s Directorate of Investigations successfully executed three operations to arrest individuals receiving bribes. It was reported that nine individuals were caught red-handed accepting bribes in Nineveh governorate.

The Directorate mentioned that the Nineveh Investigation Team, after surveillance and investigation, managed to arrest five individuals in the act of accepting bribes. This included the capture of four intermediaries as they received 750,000 Iraqi dinars from a citizen, and then delivered it to a fifth [suspect], a “chief” member of the Nineveh Intelligence and Counter-Terrorism Directorate – Al-Hadba Branch, in exchange for stamping three transactions to issue Iraqi nationality. The team also seized empty and stamped security audit forms in the possession of the [suspect] for families of “ISIS” terrorist gangs.

Additionally, two employees from the Mosul Municipality Directorate, working in the municipal sector of flowers in the Department of Encroachments, were caught receiving a bribe of 600,000 Iraqi dinars from an individual. The bribe was in exchange for overlooking and not preventing their encroachment on two parcels of agricultural land owned by the municipality.

Furthermore, an employee from the Nineveh Water Directorate – Revenue Department, was arrested after he bargained with a cafeteria owner and requested 500,000 Iraqi dinars in exchange for waiving the collection of debts owed to the Water Directorate, totaling 3,500,000 million dinars.

The Commission indicated that three arrest reports were organized for the operations executed based on judicial warrants. These reports, along with the accused individuals, were presented to the special investigative judge, who ordered the detention of the accused in the first and third operations under the provisions of Resolution No. 160 of 1983.