Hey...It Wasn't Me...It was the Other Guy That Looks Just Like Me With The Exact Same Name...Iraqi Outgoing Provincial Chief Suspected Of Embezzling $130 Million
Monday April 6th, 2009 / 15h44
BAQOUBA, Iraq (AFP)--An arrest warrant has been issued for an outgoing Iraqi provincial council chief for allegedly misappropriating nearly $130 million in public funds, police said Monday.
"The judicial authorities have issued an arrest warrant against Ibrahim Hassan Bajilan, who is suspected of embezzlement," said an official in Baqouba, capital of the province of Diyala northeast of Baghdad. However Bajilan, a member of Iraqi President Jalal Talabani's Patriotic Union of Kurdistan, or PUK, party, denied the allegation.
"It is completely false," he told AFP by telephone. "It was me who contacted the authorities, and judicial sources in Diyala province assured me it was someone with the same name who is being sought. It certainly isn't me!" Mahdi Saleh, a provincial councilor with the Islamic Party, told AFP that when the accounts for 2008 were being done "we discovered expenditure on fictitious projects and unjustified cash deposits in his accounts.
"Anti-corruption officials have asked Bajilan to reimburse 150 billion dinars ($128 million) to the state. He has refused. So the council referred the case to the judicial authorities," Saleh said. Iraq staged provincial elections Jan. 31 in 14 of the country's 18 provinces, including Diyala.
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