KUWAIT: Kuwait’s State Audit Bureau (SAB) said it reviewed 545 transactions with a value of around KD 883 million ($2.8 billion) since March 12 up until Saturday. Fatma Darwish, SAB’s senior auditor at prior supervision for social affairs, said in a statement to KUNA that auditing saved KD 30 million ($96 million) in public funds. She said 57 percent of the transactions were coronavirus-related, or KD 377 million ($1.2 billion). A SAB team is scrutinizing government contracts and transactions during the pandemic.

1,230 recoveries

In other news, Health Minister Dr Basel Al-Sabah announced, on Sunday, the recovery of 1,230 people from the coronavirus (COVID-19), bringing the tally to 11,386. In remarks to KUNA, the minister said analyses and medical examinations and tests proved that these cases were cured of the coronavirus. The recovered will be transferred to the hospital recuperation ward, pending their discharge within the next few days, he said.

13 flights

Separately, the Directorate General of Civil Aviation announced that 13 flights departed Kuwait International Airport yesterday, carrying a total of 2,478 passengers. They include six flights to Egypt, four flights to India, one flight to Qatar, one flight to Saudi Arabia, and one to the Philippines.

Oman cyclone

In an unrelated topic, Kuwait’s National Assembly Speaker Marzouq Al-Ghanem sent on Saturday two cables to Chairman of the Council of State of Oman Yahya al-Mantheri and Chairman of Oman’s Majlis Shura Khalid Al-Mawali to offer condolences to families of the victims of the powerful cyclone which recently hit the Omani province of Dhofar, leaving many people either dead or injured. He also wished mercy for the dead and swift recovery for the injured.