Scandal in Anbar as Investigation Uncovers Hundreds of ISIS Members Receiving 'Martyr' Salaries

ERBIL (Kurdistan24) – In a scandal that strikes at the very heart of Iraq's post-war reconciliation and compensation efforts, officials in Anbar Governorate have revealed a massive and deeply entrenched corruption scheme in which the families of approximately 900 eliminated members of the "ISIS" organization have been illicitly receiving government salaries designated for the victims of terrorism. 

The revelations, which point to a "dangerous corruption network" allegedly protected by the province's ruling party, have exposed a systematic forgery operation that has siphoned off vast sums of public money, rewarding the perpetrators of a brutal insurgency while the true victims of their violence are left waiting for justice.

The explosive details of the scheme were brought to light by Raheeb al-Hayes, the head of the Martyrs and Wounded Committee in Anbar Governorate. In a statement to the Iraqi news outlet Al-Jeebal, al-Hayes confirmed the staggering scope of the fraud. 

"There are hundreds of individuals who received retirement salaries, who belonged to ISIS elements and were killed in liberation battles with security forces in 2015 and 2016," he stated, referring to the fierce fighting that ultimately drove the extremist group from its strongholds in the province.

In response to the discovery, al-Hayes announced that a specialized investigative committee has been formed to review and categorize all compensation claims and to root out the extensive forgery. The scale of the problem is immense.

He affirmed that the investigative committee, based in Baghdad, has already been forced to halt the salaries of approximately 30,000 records after uncovering widespread forgery and manipulation in applicants' transactions. While some salary disbursements are continuing at lower rates to allow for greater scrutiny, the goal is to systematically identify and eliminate all fraudulent claims.

"Corruption and transaction forgery occurred during the previous period," al-Hayes admitted, "but now there are strict committees, and we do not allow any transaction that does not meet the conditions to pass. We have stopped the salaries of terrorist elements whose families were receiving salaries as martyrs."

The corruption has festered within the very institutions designed to heal the wounds of the war.

After Anbar was liberated from ISIS, the Iraqi government established a system to classify individuals killed due to military operational errors as "martyrs," making their families eligible for retirement salaries, provided it could be proven they had no affiliation with the terrorist group.

This system, managed by the Martyrs Foundation and the Reconstruction Fund for Liberated Areas, was intended to provide a measure of justice and support for innocent civilians caught in the crossfire. Instead, it became a vehicle for what one official has described as one of the "most dangerous corruption files and a major scandal."

Dhary al-Rishawi, a spokesperson for the al-Harak al-Shaabi, or Popular Movement, in Anbar, told Al-Jeebal that "corruption in Anbar's compensation file, especially in the Martyrs Foundation, has reached dangerous levels."

He explained that through the forgery of medical reports, ISIS fighters killed during military operations have been fraudulently reclassified as victims, allowing their families to claim state benefits. He alleged that this is not the work of low-level criminals but a sophisticated operation with high-level protection.

"The corruption operation in this file is protected by the ruling party, which is the primary patron of corruption," Al-Rishawi claimed, "as there are a number of front-line employees who have support from high-ranking figures, and are paid money for corruption and forgery."

Tariq al-Dulaimi, a member of the United Anbar Alliance, echoed this sentiment, stating that the file is a "natural result of the presence of a number of corrupt employees belonging to the ruling party, which manages the corruption process and wastes public funds."

He provided an even higher estimate of the fraud's scale, revealing that "more than two thousand ISIS members forged their transactions and medical reports, claiming to be martyrs in military operations or victims of ISIS."

The price for this deception was steep; according to Al-Dulaimi, a single fraudulent transaction could cost as much as $50,000, with a "dangerous corruption network" managing the file in concert with "the office manager of an influential and dominant party in Anbar Governorate."

The bitter irony, he pointed out, is that "hundreds of victims of terrorism, both killed and wounded, have not had their transactions completed yet, while the terrorist who fought with ISIS has their relatives receiving a retirement salary, a plot of land, and other privileges."

This is not the first time the massive scale of this corruption has been brought to light.

On March 25, 2024, the Martyrs Foundation itself announced it had stopped financial waste exceeding one trillion Iraqi dinars within its Anbar department and was scrutinizing 22,000 suspicious transactions. The National Security Service has also previously announced the discovery of a corruption network that embezzled approximately one trillion Iraqi dinars ($760 million) meant for ISIS victims, leading to the arrest of over 30 suspects, including senior government employees.

The Commander of Anbar Operations, Staff Lieutenant General Nasser Al-Ghannam, has even revealed that "senior officers are involved in this file."

The illicit gains from this network have been substantial. Activist Bilal Al-Jumaili told Al-Jeebal that "hundreds of employees in health, compensation, and pension departments have bought villas outside Iraq," and that a large portion of the stolen funds goes to finance the ruling party in Anbar.

In a particularly egregious revelation, he added, "there are living individuals in Anbar who are receiving salaries as martyrs, after forging death certificates."

Despite these repeated revelations and the clear involvement of high-ranking figures, there is a pervasive sense among local officials and activists that the anti-corruption measures taken by the central government have been "very weak" and compromised by "complacency... for political purposes."

As Tariq Al-Dulaimi stressed, it is imperative to "continue the process of pursuing the corrupt and reaching the high-ranking figures responsible for this file," not just the junior employees. As the investigation continues, the scandal in Anbar stands as a painful testament to the deep-seated challenges of corruption and political patronage that continue to undermine Iraq's recovery and poison the path to genuine reconciliation.