SULAIMANI, Kurdistan region ‘Iraq’,— Kurdistan Parliament member Ali Hama Salih said on Wednesday that $1.107 billion USD has gone missing in the last three months from the Iraqi Kurdistan Region’s oil revenue.

Salih, a member of the Change Movement (Gorran), has attempted to shed light on oil revenues generated by the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) in the last three months in a recent statement.

Salih says oil revenue generated from pipeline exports has amounted to $650 million USD, including $75 million USD allocated to oil companies, contingent to the KRG’s Ministry of Natural Resources.

The KRG received $303 million USD from oil exports via pipeline, with $71 million USD paid to oil companies. In March, $557 million USD was generated through pipeline exports with $36 million USD allocated to the oil companies, according to Salih.

Salih said, citing the MNR’s press release, of the $1.528 billion USD that the KRG’s MNR has generated in total in the last three months $182 million USD was allocated to the oil companies. The ministry therefore received the remaining $348 billion USD directly, according to Salih.

The parliament member pointed to the oil revenue generated by oil pumped from the Kurdistan Region’s oil fields, saying the monthly oil revenue from domestic exports and oil tankers is between $175-200 million USD, generating $525 million USD in oil revenue each month.

Salih said he based his calculations on the revenues of directorates of oil distribution in 2015. Oil generated via domestic exports, aside from revenue received by selling crude oil by tankers, amounted to $150 million USD each month in 2015 and generated $1.8 billion USD in total.

“This amount of revenue has been deposited in Kurdistan’s domestic bank,” Salih said.

The oil revenue for the government’s treasury in the last three months from pipeline exports, oil tankers and domestic exports was $1.871 million USD, of which $800 million USD was allocated to salary payments in January and February of 2016, according to Salih.

He said of that amount, “about $1.071 billion USD is missing.”

The ruling Massoud Barzani family is routinely accused of corruption and nepotism by Kurdish politicians as well as international observers. One of the most sensitive subjects is the Barzanis’ involvement in the economy of the oil rich Kurdish region.

Senior officials in the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) have long been accused of corruption or taking government money.

Many Kurdish politicians and observers believe that many of the oil industry projects in Iraqi Kurdistan are conducted in a non-transparent way. Some have even described them as secretive.

Read more about Corruption in Iraqi Kurdistan

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