The United States has resumed some air shipments of US dollars to Iraq after suspending them for several months, according to two aides to the Iraqi prime minister cited by The New York Times on Thursday, 2 July.
Haider Al-Aboudi, spokesperson for the Iraqi prime minister, told the newspaper, "Dollar shipments to Iraq have resumed ."
The report said Mudher Mohammed Salih, the prime minister's financial adviser, also confirmed that the transfers had resumed.
Washington halted a cash shipment worth about $500 million that was bound for Iraq in April. It suspended some aspects of its security cooperation with Baghdad in a move aimed at pressuring the Iraqi government over the actions of Iran-backed factions . The New York Times report said that the suspension of cooperation and funding to Iraqi security agencies remains in place.
Neither the White House, the US State Department, nor the US Treasury Department had responded to requests for comment outside normal business hours. Reuters was not immediately able to independently verify the report.
The issue of suspended dollar shipments dates back to April, when the US Treasury prevented the delivery of about $500 million in Iraqi oil revenues held in accounts at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. The move was described at the time as an effort to pressure Baghdad to dismantle armed factions linked to Iran.
A freeze accompanied it on some security cooperation programmes and counterterrorism funding provided to Iraqi forces.
The Central Bank of Iraq said at the time that it was not experiencing a shortage of US currency and had continued to meet requests from banks and exchange companies.
A government economic adviser explained that the suspension affected only a limited portion, about 5%, of the inflows allocated to meet travellers' cash needs, which were also affected by the suspension of air traffic and airport closures during that period.
The issue comes amid broader US pressure on Baghdad, including sanctions imposed in May under a campaign known as "Economic Fury", which targeted an Iraqi oil official and several leaders.
The measures came amid warnings that Iraq faces a test of its ability to transition from a cash-based economy dependent on the US dollar to a more modern and transparent financial system, while the country continues to rely on monthly US cash inflows estimated at $1 billion to support the stability of the Iraqi dinar exchange rate. Article translated from Arabic by Afrah Almatwari. To read the original, click here .