ERBIL, Kurdistan Region of Iraq – The Iraqi Supreme Judicial Council on Sunday issued a directive to the presidency of the court of cessation, the Public Prosecution and all appeal courts ordering the monitoring of excessively large dowries in marriage contracts as a means for laundering money.

“In cases where a marriage transaction is submitted before a personal status court and the recorded dowry is extraordinarily and unusually high according to local customs… the court must require both parties to explain the source of the funds in a written statement signed by both parties before the marriage contract is carried out,” read a document obtained by The New Region, which is signed by President of the Supreme Judicial Council Faiq Zaidan.

“If the judge… is persuaded that there is no genuine intent to marry—believing the contract to be a sham aimed at laundering the dowry amount—an official decision must be made within the original case file referring both parties, along with a copy of the marriage contract documentation to the Anti-Money Laundering Office to proceed with investigations into the legality and source of the dowry,” the document added.

The issue of money laundering is not foreign to Iraq, a discrepancy between the value of the US dollar as set by the central bank compared to its actual value in the Iraqi markets, around 1,320 to 1,500, was exploited for years by people who found different ways of converting the difference to their advantage, despite the governments efforts to address the pattern.  

Iraq scores 140th out of 180 when it comes to countries’ corruption rates, according to the 2024 Corruption Perceptions Index by Transparency International. 

Corruption rank in Iraq averaged 161.19 from 2003 until 2023, reaching an all-time high of 178.00 in 2007 and a record low of 113.00 in 2003.