BAGHDAD: Iraq’s Kurdish region has announced it will pay only partial salaries to all government employees except security personnel as it struggles with an economic crisis due to low oil prices.
The autonomous region in northern Iraq, like the rest of the country, has been suffering from the huge drop in oil prices since mid-2014. Kurdish leader Massud Barzani this week called for a referendum on independence, but economic challenges effectively rule out a viable Iraqi Kurdish state for now.
The salaries decision was taken “in order to ensure the continued distribution of part of the monthly salaries and allowances,” the region’s government said in a statement late Wednesday.
The unpaid portion of the salaries going forward, as well as previously unpaid wages from last year, will be considered “loans remaining with the government, and will be returned later,” the statement said. The new measures will affect higher salaries more than lower, it said.
