Volume 1 - Iraq Watch

Muzahim Sa’ab al-Hasan al-NasiriFigure 40. MIC leadership.al-Tawab Mullah Huwaysh controlled the Rafidianaccounts. He determined how much was to be sent toeach foreign bank account based on project funding,and ordered transfers of exact amounts to specificbanks and account numbers. Huwaysh was responsiblefor authorizing each transfer to each account inJordan and Lebanon. Following the transfers, al-Rahim, ‘Abbas, and Hasan then controlled the fundsin the Jordan and Lebanon bank accounts.All of these accounts were related to Iraqi trade contracts,for the payment of foreign suppliers to the Iraqigovernment. When a contract was signed with a supplier,a bank letter-of-credit was opened on behalf ofthe supplier. The goods were delivered to a companyowned by MIC or working for the MIC. The goodswere inspected, and then Huwaysh was notified.Huwaysh then notified the Commercial Departmentat MIC, and then the Commercial Department sent amemo to ‘Abbas, al-Rahim, and Hasan. The three ofthem then sent a memo to the Jordan or Lebanon bankto release the funds in the form of a letter of credit tothe supplier.The MIC used accounts in the Al-Itihad and Al-Ahaybanks in Beirut. According to a high-level officialwith the MIC, approximately one month prior toOIF, Huwaysh dispatched Hasan and Munir MamduhAwad al-Qubaysi, Director of Al-Basha’ir, to Beiruton a mission to recover MIC funds still held in Beirutbanks. Their instructions were to travel to Beirut,secure the funds, transfer them to the Iraqi embassyin Damascus and then return to Baghdad. Huwayshhad ordered a review of outstanding contracts morethan a year old and as a result was able to identify$100 to $150 million in these banks that had not beendisbursed.• According to two sources in the CommercialDirectorate, prior to the war there was a meeting inBaghdad with members of the Commercial Sectionand the Legal Section of the MIC. They claim thatHasan and al-Rahim were ordered to remove $47million from the banks in Lebanon and Jordan.• They attempted to withdraw funds from the JordanNational Bank but were informed that they did nothave that amount of funds available because ofunauthorized withdrawals from suppliers.• One of the two sources in the Commercial Directoratestated that Hasan and Ali Jum’a Husayn Khalafcanceled approximately 60 lines of credit and wereable to withdraw $6 million in currency from theJordan National Bank, which they then took to theIraqi Embassy in Syria.68