usmc4669
03-14-04, 07:53 PM
Posted by WhiteKnight on 2004-03-14; 18:38:54 (message 12242; 12 reads)
Let Me see. kerry's touting his popularity among foreigners as the french bank that's holding all the oil for palaces money shreds documents and lauders cash, and THEN the un decides to start a probe of the program that was going on for 12 years. Nice. Nice work, if you can get it. ****************
UN caves in on inquiry into its Iraq oil-for-food 'scandal' By Charles Laurence in New York, and Inigo Gilmore (Filed: 14/03/2004) UK telegraph
The United Nations has bowed to international pressure to investigate allegations of corruption surrounding its oil-for-food programme, under which Iraqi oil was sold on behalf of Saddam Hussein's regime.
The move follows claims that UN officials were caught up in a reward system set up by Saddam, which apparently granted proceeds from the sale of million of barrels of oil to friendly politicians, officials and businessmen around the world. UN official Benon Sevan
Iraq's new governing council has hired the accountants KPMG and the international law firm, Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer, to investigate claims that large sums of money - which should have been spent on food and medicine for ordinary Iraqis - were diverted through oil "vouchers" to line pockets abroad.
In a letter to Kofi Annan, the UN Secretary General, an adviser to Iraq's interim governing council warns that the UN appeared to have "failed in its responsibility" to the Iraqi people and to the international community. "It will not come as a surprise if the Oil-for-Food Programme turns out to have been one of the world's most disgraceful scams, and an example of inadequate control, responsibility and transparency, providing an opportune vehicle for Saddam Hussein to operate under the UN aegis to continue his reign of terror and oppression," wrote Claude Hankes-Drielsma, a British businessman and former chairman of the management committee at Price Waterhouse accountants, on March 3.
A senior UN official said last night that the international body's Office of Oversight Services in New York, had started to examine the administration of the programme and any UN role in the alleged corruption. A formal announcement of the internal inquiry is expected this week.
Last month the UN denied accusations of corruption within its operations and demanded documentary evidence before it would act on the complaints.
Benon Sevan, the Assistant Secretary General - who was appointed director of Oil-for-Food in 1996 - is on holiday until the end of next month, when he will retire from the United Nations Secretariat, a UN spokesman said.
Mr Sevan's name appears on documents allegedly recovered from Baghdad's Oil Ministry that are at the heart of the investigation launched by the Iraqi Governing Council. In January, an Iraqi newspaper published a list of 270 individuals and organisations which allegedly received oil vouchers up to 1999. It is not known if the documents on which the list was based are authentic.
Mr Sevan, a career UN official, has denied any wrongdoing.Mr Hankes-Drielsma first alerted Mr Annan to the potential scandal last December and asked him to instigate an "independent commission". In a letter dated December 5, he wrote of his belief that "serious transgressions have taken place" and urged the UN to start an inquiry to "take the moral high ground and the initiative in demonstrating to the world that those guilty will be brought to account."
Read the whole story at
http://www.drudge.com/
Let Me see. kerry's touting his popularity among foreigners as the french bank that's holding all the oil for palaces money shreds documents and lauders cash, and THEN the un decides to start a probe of the program that was going on for 12 years. Nice. Nice work, if you can get it. ****************
UN caves in on inquiry into its Iraq oil-for-food 'scandal' By Charles Laurence in New York, and Inigo Gilmore (Filed: 14/03/2004) UK telegraph
The United Nations has bowed to international pressure to investigate allegations of corruption surrounding its oil-for-food programme, under which Iraqi oil was sold on behalf of Saddam Hussein's regime.
The move follows claims that UN officials were caught up in a reward system set up by Saddam, which apparently granted proceeds from the sale of million of barrels of oil to friendly politicians, officials and businessmen around the world. UN official Benon Sevan
Iraq's new governing council has hired the accountants KPMG and the international law firm, Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer, to investigate claims that large sums of money - which should have been spent on food and medicine for ordinary Iraqis - were diverted through oil "vouchers" to line pockets abroad.
In a letter to Kofi Annan, the UN Secretary General, an adviser to Iraq's interim governing council warns that the UN appeared to have "failed in its responsibility" to the Iraqi people and to the international community. "It will not come as a surprise if the Oil-for-Food Programme turns out to have been one of the world's most disgraceful scams, and an example of inadequate control, responsibility and transparency, providing an opportune vehicle for Saddam Hussein to operate under the UN aegis to continue his reign of terror and oppression," wrote Claude Hankes-Drielsma, a British businessman and former chairman of the management committee at Price Waterhouse accountants, on March 3.
A senior UN official said last night that the international body's Office of Oversight Services in New York, had started to examine the administration of the programme and any UN role in the alleged corruption. A formal announcement of the internal inquiry is expected this week.
Last month the UN denied accusations of corruption within its operations and demanded documentary evidence before it would act on the complaints.
Benon Sevan, the Assistant Secretary General - who was appointed director of Oil-for-Food in 1996 - is on holiday until the end of next month, when he will retire from the United Nations Secretariat, a UN spokesman said.
Mr Sevan's name appears on documents allegedly recovered from Baghdad's Oil Ministry that are at the heart of the investigation launched by the Iraqi Governing Council. In January, an Iraqi newspaper published a list of 270 individuals and organisations which allegedly received oil vouchers up to 1999. It is not known if the documents on which the list was based are authentic.
Mr Sevan, a career UN official, has denied any wrongdoing.Mr Hankes-Drielsma first alerted Mr Annan to the potential scandal last December and asked him to instigate an "independent commission". In a letter dated December 5, he wrote of his belief that "serious transgressions have taken place" and urged the UN to start an inquiry to "take the moral high ground and the initiative in demonstrating to the world that those guilty will be brought to account."
Read the whole story at
http://www.drudge.com/