"I think we can do business with this man," Kofi Annan.

2% right off the top

"WHEN UNITED NATIONS SECRETARY GENERAL Kofi Annan quipped several years ago that he could "do business" with Saddam Hussein, he meant it figuratively. In light of the substantive charges coming out of the ever-expanding Oil-for-Food scandal, the throwaway line seems revealing or at least ironic.
"I think we have to take him literally," says Republican senator Norm Coleman, who is leading one of eight investigations into the corruption and mismanagement of the U.N.'s largest-ever humanitarian relief effort.
The basic outline of the scandal is simple: Saddam Hussein used the Oil-for-Food program to circumvent U.N. sanctions imposed after the Gulf war and to enrich himself and his allies. He did this by bribing leading journalists and diplomats and demanding kickbacks from those who profited from selling Iraqi oil. That he was able to do so indicates at least that the U.N. badly mismanaged the program it set up in December 1996. None of this is particularly astonishing. No one is surprised to learn that Saddam Hussein cheats, that politicians take bribes, and that the competence level of the U.N. bureaucracy is, well, suboptimal."

From the start the United Nations was bought with Saddam's money. The United Nations became an enabler of theft and greed all for the 2% off of the top. Saddam an old briber from way back knew exactly what he was doing, he knew that kind of money flowing in to the UN would give him carte blanche with what ever he wanted to do, he paid everyone who put their hands out including members of the Security Council and their governments. Ron

A recap of UN abuse by Claudia Rosett

Iraq and the Importance of the U.N.'s Oil-for-Food Scandal

The oil-for food scandal the biggest heist in the history of humanitarian relief. It involved thousands of contractors in dozens of countries and Saddam personally obtained vast sums of money from the program. In all, the program is estimated to have involved $9-17 billion, but it may have been even more.
As a result, there are three investigations in congress, federal prosecutors have indicted suspects and named two officials and there has been an internal U.N. investigation. The organization has an important aim but a rotten core. In particular, the oil-for-food scandal demonstrates that, at the U.N., incentives matter, because there is a culture of privilege and secrecy.
There has been a proliferation of other U.N. scandals, such as the African sex scandal; auditing problems; the resignation of the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees amid allegations of sexual harassment; and the U.N. Commission on Human Rights admitting Zimbabwe, and so on. None of these, however, have attracted the same amount of attention. This scandal has opened at window into the U.N. itself in a way other U.N. scandals have not.

Please give the boxes back, pleads Mr. Volcker

Henry Hyde is laughing

"Mr. Parton, a former FBI agent, and a fellow investigator quit Mr. Volcker's $30 million investigation last month to protest the soft treatment they felt was given to U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan.

Mr. Volcker also said the congressional committees probing the $10 billion Iraq oil-for-food scandal should immediately return more than a half-dozen boxes of documents Mr. Parton turned over to the House International Relations Committee Thursday in response to a subpoena. Mr. Parton's cooperation with Capitol Hill committees would violate the U.N. inquiry's immunity and also a confidentiality agreement he signed when he joined the inquiry last year.

Paul Volcker, the head of the U.N.-appointed panel probing the oil-for-food scandal, yesterday asked Congress to drop its efforts to force an investigator who resigned from the panel to testify about any top-level corruption at the world body."

Sen. Coleman and Rep. Hyde must have a great deal of satisfaction hearing Mr. Volcker ask for the evidence back that Mr. Parton brought to them. Henry Hyde was treated like like a child by Kofi Annan when he asked for cooperation by formal letter in April of 2004. Mr. Annan didn't even have the courtesy to give Mr. Hyde a reply for over 6 months. We can see by the information that has dribbled out just why Mr. Annan didn't want to cooperate, his son and most of the Secretariat and even the former Secretary General of the United Nations, Mr. Boutros-Boutros Ghalli were involved in scamming. Mr. Annan's former chief of staff Mr. Riza tried his best to run boxes and boxes and hundreds of thousands of pieces of evidence for 24/7 through the shredders; how galling it must be that Hyde and Coleman got some of it before it could be destroyed.

Benan Sevan wants legal fee's paid by UN

Sounds like a warning to UN

Benon Sevan, who once headed the United Nations' oil-for-food program, hinted in a recent letter to the U.N. chief of staff, Mark Malloch Brown, that he would consider retributions against the organization if it refused to reimburse the mounting legal fees he has incurred while attempting to fend off allegations related to the progra

The April 10 letter to Mr. Malloch Brown was penned by Mr. Sevan's somewhat lower-profile lawyer, Eric Lewis. Mr. Lewis demanded that the United Nations reconsider its prior decision not to reimburse the legal fees incurred by Mr. Sevan as result of oil-for-food accusations.

Mr. Lewis implied in his letter that Mr. Sevan could go public with the circumstances surrounding the initial promise by the United Nations to cover Mr. Sevan's legal fees - and the organization's subsequent about-face. Mr. Sevan's knowledge of the program might include potentially damaging information about several U.N. officials.

The ties between Volcker, Strong and Canadian Corp.

Not only Volcker and Strong

UNITED NATIONS - The next chapter in the United Nations crisis may erupt over U.N. investigator Paul Volcker's membership on the board of one of Canada's biggest companies, Power Corporation, since a past president of the firm, Canadian tycoon Maurice Strong, is now tied to the oil-for-food scandal.

Also, following yesterday's reports of resignations of top investigators on Mr. Volcker's team, Washington officials revisited Secretary-General Annan's assertion that the team's report last month exonerated him. For the first time, the Bush administration hinted that it may cease support of Mr. Annan altogether.

Deputy Secretary-General, Canadian Louise Frechette is already being mentioned as a replacement for Kofi Annan but it has to be remembered that Ms. Frechette was brought into the UN by Mr. Maurice Strong and that four years into the seven-year Oil-for-Food program, with graft and mismanagement by then rampant, Frechette intervened directly by telephone to stop United Nations auditors from forwarding their investigations to the U.N. Security Council. This detail was buried on page 186 of the 219-page interim report Volcker's Independent Inquiry Committee released Feb. 3. Deputy Secretary-General, Canadian Louise Frechette Blocked UN Auditors, this has to be remembered when/if Kofi Annan is replaced. Ron

Kofi not exonerated say's US State Department official.

"Time to step aside"

Deputy Secretary-General, Canadian Louise Frechette, more information

Annan wants to "reform" the U.N. again

Claudia Rosett

Since the U.N.'s self-described dawn of integrity three years ago (one of several such sunrises since Mr. Annan became secretary-general in 1997), we have seen the sex-for-food scandal in the Congo, featuring the rape of minors by U.N. peacekeepers, which continued well after press disclosures last year prompted a U.N. internal investigation. We have seen theft at the World Meteorological Association, scandal in the U.N. audit department, the resignation over sexual harassment charges of the refugee high commissioner Ruud Lubbers, turmoil within the Electoral Assistance Division, and allegations of corruption involving the U.N.'s Geneva-based World Intellectual Property Organization. We have seen rebellion by the U.N. Staff Union against "senior management, and a raft of resignations by senior U.N. officials who nonetheless linger on the premises on official salaries of a dollar a year, plus the various perquisites and connections the place affords.

UN staff have recommended that Maurice Strong be suspended according to report.

IMPORTANT UPDATE: Investigators Robert Parton (senior investigative counsel) and Miranda Duncan (deputy counsel) have resigned because information was not being followed up by the Volcker Committee!!! These are two of the top three field investigators for the committtee. Only Michael Cornacchia remains. Hat tip to Roger L. Simon

Maurice Strong resigns

Maurice Strong knows "`Koreagate Man'"

What else don't we know

Strong, got his start in the world of business by Paul Desmarais’ Montreal-based Power Corporation. Desmarais is a key figure in Paribas BNP, Saddam’s favourite bank, officials of which are said to be "cooperating with investigators" in the oil-for-food probe.

Strong also happens to be a power behind the throne in Canadian politics as senior advisor to adscam, scandal-plagued Canadian Prime Minister Paul Martin--also launched into the business world by Power Corp.

Kofi Annan’s special envoy to Korea Maurice Strong admits he knows "Koreagate Man" Tongsun Park and even that Park invested in an "energy company" with which he was associated in 1997--but flatly denies any involvement in the scandal-ridden UN oil-for-food program.

As Kofi Annan’s special envoy to Korea, Strong returns from his Korean trips to openly criticize the U.S. Strong told CBS’s Dan Rather on May 26, 2004: "The single most important thing that comes out of my discussions there is the strong conviction that the country is threatened by the United States. They contend that this is the reason, and the only reason, that they require nuclear weapons."

Another Canadian implicated in huge theft of 8 Billion

$425 Million of aid money missing in Canada

It's official: Kofi says the US and England did it.

Kofi blames US

"U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan, who earlier angered the United States and Britain by calling the Iraq war 'illegal,' has upset both nations again -- this time accusing them of allowing Saddam Hussein to enrich himself selling oil outside the U.N.-run oil-for-food program.
    Mr. Annan set off the latest dispute on Thursday by asserting that Saddam made more money smuggling oil to Jordan and Turkey -- under the noses of the United States and Britain -- than he skimmed from the 1996-2003 U.N.-run oil-for-food program.

Mr. Annan just can't make something like this fly. Even though his hand picked investigators led by Mr. Volcker does his best to hide information that is cascading forth, Mr. Volcker can't keep it all in and we learn of such things as paper shredding by Kofi Annan's Chief of Staff.

"The most significant finding in the Volcker Report is undoubtedly the revelation that Kofi Annan's then-Chief of Staff Iqbal Riza authorized the shredding between April and December 2004 of thousands of UN documents--the entire UN Chef de Cabinet chronological files for the years 1997, 1998 and 1999, many of which related to the oil-for-food program."

Only in the never-never land of UN bureaucracy could you find some one like Kofi Annan and his Secretariat. This organization is dangerous and has to be down sized for our safety, it is trying to gain a position of more power than its member states. It is an unelected group of nameless and unaccountable greymen who have brought forth genocide's, rapes, pedophilia and the most monumental theft of all time.

The United State has to stop buying into the UN bureaucracy, its an incremental thing that they are attempting and the only thing they need is time and they have decades to outlast any opponent. First the "Kyoto Protocol" and then the ICC and now the Law of the Sea, just a little bit at a time until we have something out of Orwell's 1984. Ron

Kojo's friend in UN bribery investigation

UN's Kofi Annan has to explain the shreding

What about the coverup Kofi?

"The most significant finding in the Second Interim Report is that Iqbal Riza, Kofi Annan’s chief of staff, authorized the shredding of thousands of U.N. documents between April and December 2004. Among these documents were the entire U.N. Chef de Cabinet chronological files for 1997, 1998, and 1999—many of which related to the Oil-for-Food Program.

Riza approved this destruction just 10 days after he had personally written to the heads of nine U.N.-related agencies that administered the Oil-for-Food Program in Northern Iraq, requesting that they “take all necessary steps to collect, preserve and secure all files, records and documents…relating to the Oil-for-Food Programme.”[8] The destruction continued for more than seven months after the Secretary-General’s June 1, 2004, order to U.N. staff members “not to destroy or remove any documents related to the Oil-for-Food programme that are in their possession or under their control, and to not instruct or allow anyone else to destroy or remove such documents.”[9]

Significantly, Kofi Annan announced the retirement of Mr. Riza on January 15, 2005—the same day that Riza notified the Volcker Committee that he had destroyed the documents.[10] Riza was immediately replaced by Mark Malloch Brown, Administrator of the U.N. Development Programme."

At the United Nations, the senior administrator under Kofi Annan has willfully and deliberately shredded documents that pertained to the greatest rip off in history and Annan lets him retire the same day that he notified Volcker of the documents destruction. The records were so voluminous that it took seven months to shred them all and Annan professes he knows nothing about it, can there be anyone that would believe such a lie. The responsibility stopped with Annan and for this if nothing else he should be forced to resign. Ron

Kofi Annan, a sad case.

Kofi's not up to it.

Stop the presses. As it turns out, the mismanagement of the multi-billion United Nations' Oil-for-Food scam -- run with all the oversight of a back-alley cock fight -- reaches to the office of Mr. United Nations himself -- His Excellency Kofi Annan. The world has expressed shock its beloved Mr. Annan -- the Nobel Peace Prize winner and would-be reformer -- is not a saint after all. Go figure.

The phrase "Oil-for-Food" is now synonymous with "corruption" and it is only the tip of the iceberg. Embezzlement has been reported at the World Meteorological Organization. Rape and pedophilia are rampant among U.N. peacekeepers. Last summer, the U.N. staff gave Mr. Annan a vote of no confidence and demanded his ouster.

The U.N. human rights record is a joke. Claims of sexual harassment have been leveled against a top manager. In August 2003, U.N. employees -- 22 of them -- were killed because of improper security measures by incompetent U.N. security personnel. In the face of terrorism and genocide, the U.N. sits on the sidelines quibbling over the proper definitions of terms.

Kofi, Kojo and Kotecna in Kahoots?

Simon hits a gold seam

No joy for Kofi Annan today. Roger L. Simon has posted some information that will cause him some pain. It looks as though information is about to come out that will tie Kofi into Cotecna just a little tighter because of his son. In part Mr. Simon tells the story of business dealings and meeting of Kojo Annan with people he really shouldn't have been associating with.

“The Volcker committee has been interviewing Pierre Mouselli, a businessman in Paris who was Kojo's business partner. Their relationship started in 1998 when then 45-year old Mouselli met young Kojo (then 23) at a Bastille Day Party in the French Embassy in Lagos, Nigeria. Mouselli, who has been a cooperative witness and is not under investigation himself, has told the committee numerous interesting things, which deserved to be followed up,”

He tells of meetings between Kojo and two separate Iraqi Ambassadors to Nigeria and a trip in September 1998 by Mouselli and Kojo to the Non-Aligned Nations Movement Conference in Durban, South Africa during which they traveled with the Secretary General's entourage.

Other interesting stuff in the blog that really opens a can of worms for Kofi about his son's business dealing. He really didn't need this coming out just now. Go to the site and read the article in its entirety.

Times: Kofi May Resign

The Sunday Times: Depressed Annan close to quitting over UN scandals

KOFI ANNAN, the United Nations secretary-general, is said to be struggling with depression and considering his future. Colleagues have reported concerns about Annan ahead of an official report this week that will examine his son Kojo’s connection to the controversial Iraqi oil for food scheme.

Depending on the findings of the report, by a team led by the former US Federal Reserve chairman Paul Volcker, Annan may have to choose between the secretary-generalship and loyalty to his son.

...

One close observer at the UN said Annan’s moods were like a “sine curve” and that he appeared near the bottom of the trough.

...

“Kofi Annan is going to find his position increasingly untenable,” said Nile Gardiner, an expert on the UN at the conservative Heritage Foundation. “There is a strong possibility he will resign voluntarily because of his declining credibility.”

(Full article at link.)

Mr. Boutros-Boutros-Ghali says its a right wing plot

Family ties

Oil-for-Food Blamed on Conservatives

Former United Nations chief Boutros Boutros-Ghali is blaming the oil-for-food scandal on "right-wing politicians" in the United States, saying they are merely using it as a tool to damage the world body's reputation.

Reuters reports that Boutros-Ghali, who served as U.N. secretary-general from 1991 to 1996, also has said current chief Kofi Annan should stay right where he is.

" A gem laid out in Paul Volcker’s tabled Interim Report says: Director of the discredited Oil-for-Food Program Benon Sevan, helped steer oil contracts to a relative of former UN Secretary General Boutros-Boutros Ghali.

The relative is Ghali’s son, with whom Sevan was in business. And then there’s Sevan’s Panamanian bank account with Boutros Ghali. Ghali was head honcho [Secretary General] at the UN in 1966 when Oil-for-Food got underway. He’s also the guy who chose the Banque Nationale de Paris, now known as BNP Paribas, to handle the program’s account." From an article by Judi McLeod, Canadafreepress.com, February 7, 2005

Mr. Ghali should explain just how involved he was with Mr. Sevan. Did he have a joint account with Mr. Sevan in Panama? Was his son in business with Mr. Sevan in Panama? Did Mr. Ghali steer the banking business to BNP Paribas who's largest stockholder was a personal friend of Saddam?

Oil-for-Food: It's all relative

Jordanian 'peace' keepers accused of rape in E. Timor

Sevan threatens to go home if not treated right.

Pay the attorney fee's or else, says Sevan.

"I am shocked and dismayed that the U.N. Secretariat has agreed to pay Benon Sevan's legal fees from assets belonging to the Iraqi people," said Iraqi Ambassador Samir Sumaida'ie.

The money to reimburse Mr. Sevan, as well as the $30 million to fund the official inquiry, comes from a fund set up with Iraqi oil revenues to administer the $64 billion oil-for-food program.

However Mark Malloch Brown said that, "Mr. Sevan made it clear that if he was not reimbursed ... he was going home to Cyprus," he told reporters yesterday. "He didn't see the need to subject himself to leaks and attacks."

Mark Malloch Brown apparently hasn't heard about arresting someone who has misappropriated money under cover of "doing his job." Just think of what would have happened to the guys and girls from Enron if they would have tried this. Hey Brown, Benan Sevan had a Panamanian Corporation going along with Butros-Butros-Butros's cousin and they snagged a couple of million dollars. "...he was going home to Cyprus." Lift his immunity with out telling him and tip off Henry Hyde, Henry would sweat him like a cooked chicken. Ron

Now it's $300,000 and Kofi meets with Cotecna

How much more did Kojo make

" U.N.-appointed panel investigating influence peddling in the oil-for-food program in Iraq is examining three contacts between Secretary General Kofi Annan and executives of a Swiss company that made payments to Annan's son while it conducted millions of dollars' worth of business with the world body, a senior U.N. official said.

Malloch Brown acknowledged Wednesday that the United Nations erred in suggesting Tuesday that Volcker's committee had backed a decision by Annan to pay Sevan an undisclosed but "big number" in legal fees."

Well we know from other sources [Claudia Rosett] that Kojo worked for Cotecna up until last year, he was drawing down $2500 per month for something and now we find out that there was other moneys paid to him that double the amount previously known. Cotecna has admitted to paying out $300,000 to Kojo Annan using subterfuge in order to hide the full amounts. It isn't because Cotecna thought to do the right thing and tell the investigators, they were caught by investigative reporters [Financial Times and the Italian Paper Il Sole]. The reporters also found out about the meetings of Kofi Annan and the the owners of Cotecna, this wasn't information that was given by the Secretariat freely, Kofi got caught. Even the news that Benan Sevan's attorneys fee's were being paid out of the Iraqi slush fund wasn't freely given; someone leaked the information. Great salaries, great retirements, all the women you can fondle, unbelievable side deals, attorney fee's paid and the possibility of a huge financial prize, World Government where you can tax whole countries, where the possibilities are limitless, where everything is hidden and you have a living breathing bureaucracy that will rule all, that will live forever. Ron

King Kofi meets Cotecna secretly

Kofi gets Kott.

Kojo Annan worked for Cotecna in Nigeria until December 1997. He was later retained first as a consultant and then on an unusual “non-compete” contract. Cotecna categorically denies any impropriety.

It insists his work had nothing to do with the UN contract and that it never took advantage of Kojo's access to the secretary-general.

But the FT/Il Sole investigation reveals that senior executives from Cotecna met Kofi Annan on various occasions, once at his UN office.

A UN spokesman said the meetings had nothing to do with a contract awarded under the oil-for-food programme. Kojo Annan declined to comment.

Didn't Kofi say that he had never met any one from Cotecna? Ron

Kojo got $300K from Cotecna

Annan's son Kojo received $300,000 from Swiss company, reports say

Kojo Annan, the son of UN Secretary General Kofi Annan, received at least 300,000 dollars from a Swiss company that was awarded a contract from the UN oil- for-food program in Iraq, almost double the amount previously disclosed, Italian and British newspapers reported in today's editions.

The reports said the payments "were arranged in ways that obscured where the money came from or whom it went to."

The two papers, which conducted a joint investigation, also reported that the Secretary General met top executives of the company, twice before the oil-for-food contract was awarded in December 1998 and once afterwards.

Benan Sevan's lawyers paid by Kofi

Mr. Sevan get retirement, legal fee's paid and immunity

Just how sweet a job at the United Nations has became apparent when it was disclosed that Mr. Sevan's legal fee's are paid by the UN. First Mr. Sevan sets up a Panamanian Corporation for he and his old friend the former Secretary Generals nephew or cousin or who ever, makes a couple of million and then gets caught by some digging by Claudia Rosett. Now the New York Sun has found out that Mr. Sevan's legal fee's are being picked up by the United Nations, probably a Iraqi slush fund on some sort, the Iraqis' will be pissed off when they hear about this. Great salary, retirement in a 5 Star Hotel and all your legal bills paid and immunity besides; if Ken Lay had the same deal he would have thought he'd died and went to heaven. Ron

"After months of denials, the United Nations admitted yesterday that, in an exception to its own rules, it has paid for the legal defense of Benon Sevan. The U.N.'s own investigation panel denounced Mr. Sevan for his central role in the oil-for-food scandal that has engulfed the world body.

Questions regarding whether the U.N. would cover Mr. Sevan's legal fees were raised soon after the name of the oil-for-food program chief appeared on a list published by the Iraqi newspaper al-Mada shortly after the start of the Iraq war. The newspaper accused world diplomats, businessmen, and U.N. officials of accepting bribes from Saddam Hussein in the form of oil allocations.

U.N officials distanced themselves from Mr. Sevan, even as the former Annan confidant continued to demand that they cover his legal fees. The retired Mr. Sevan remains a U.N. employee, with a symbolic $1-a-year salary, to make himself available for questioning by an independent committee headed by Mr. Volcker."

Whistle blower get shaft, Sevan gets bills paid.

Ambassador John Bolton, just the man for the UN

Offering incentives to rogue states? "I don't do carrots." say's Bolton.

Mark Steyn cuts to the chase quickly when he begins talking about our new Ambassador to the United Nations. Steyn is no great lover of this potpourri of Thugocracies at Turtle Bay and believes Mr. Bolton is just the man to cut the crap. The United Nations has to be judged on what it has done and proposes not on hopes. dreams and promises. The biggest theft in worlds history and we are no further along in the investigation than when Claudia Rosett first brought it to our attention. Its head honcho was complicit in the Rwandan Genocide, the annihilation of the Marsh Arabs in Iraq and the apparent gang bang of women who has asked for protection, the latest being in the Sudan and the Congo. Time for Mr. Steyn though, he starts with an observation on Mr. Boutros Boutros-Ghali the former Secretary General of the UN who is apparently the partner of Mr. Benan Sevan [Head of the "Oil for Fraud" rip off under Kofi Annan] in the Panamanian shell corporation which illegally made a few million dollars in the "Oil for Fraud" rip off. He begins:

“In recent years, I can find only one example of a senior U.N. figure having the guts to call a member state a "totalitarian regime." It was former Secretary-General Boutros Boutros-Ghali last autumn, and he was talking about America. Bolton's sin isn't that he's "undiplomatic," but that he's correct."

“For much of the civilized world the transnational pablum has become an end in itself, and one largely unmoored from anything so tiresome as reality. It doesn't matter whether there is any global warming or, if there is, whether Kyoto will do anything about it or, if you ratify Kyoto, whether you bother to comply with it: All that matters is that you sign on to the transnational articles of faith. The same thinking applies to the International Criminal Court, Darfur, the Oil-for-Fraud program, and anything else involving the U.N.”

“That's what Bolton had in mind with his observations about international law: "It is a big mistake for us to grant any validity to international law even when it may seem in our short-term interest to do so -- because, over the long term, the goal of those who think that international law really means anything are those who want to constrict the United States."

The Bolton/Wolfowitz missions

Sec. Rice says's John Bolton to lead U.N. shake up

Bolton is the man for a shake up!

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said yesterday she expects John R. Bolton, Washington's ambassador-designate to the United Nations, to lead an overdue shake-up of that organization. "John Bolton was my first choice," Miss Rice told editors and reporters in an interview at The Washington Times. "I think John is a straightforward, tough-talking, very good diplomat, and I think that's what you need at the United Nations."

What is needed in United Nations right now is an investigation that is transparent. Mr. Volcker is not the person to lead that investigation. " As Canada Free Press (CFP) revealed, Paul Volcker, who heads up the Independent Inquiry Commission into the oil-for-food scandal, held a seat on Power Corp’s international advisory board. [Read the two previous articles on Power Corporation and which companies it controls]" This should have been enough to disqualify him from leading an 'independent inquiry' of the United Nations but there is something else. "In addition to his connections to Power Corp., which he did not disclose upon being appointed head of the UN probe, Volcker has also been linked to a pro-UN lobby group, the United Nations Association of the United States (which happens to receive generous support from BNP Paribas). Critics are suggesting that the final report, expected in June, could end up being a whitewash."

There is a thread through this whole hidden non-disclosure by Mr. Volcker and its called "Power Corporation." If you have no idea who owns this entity and how Mr. Volcker is involved, read the previous two entries. Ron

Why Bolton will be good for the UN

Who or what is "Power Corporation of Canada."

You have to follow the money

"When Montreal-based Power Corporation of Canada found itself, in late January, the topic of a news story on America’s top-rated Fox News Channel, which draws millions of U.S. and international viewers, executives there probably weren’t thrilled. the Fox News story wasn’t prompted by an announcement from Power of some billion-dollar takeover or the appointment of a new senior executive. It was something altogether different: the revelation that the man handpicked by the UN secretary general last April to probe the UN’s scandalized Oil-for-Food program, Paul Volcker, had not disclosed to the UN that he was a paid adviser to Power Corp., a story which had originally been broken by a small, independent Toronto newspaper, the Canada Free Press. Why did the highest-rated cable channel in the U.S. care? Because the more that Americans came to know about Oil-for-Food, which has been called the largest corruption scandal in history, the more the name of this little-known Montreal firm kept popping up."

"Now, Volcker himself is the one facing allegations of conflict. In addition to his connections to Power Corp., which he did not disclose upon being appointed head of the UN probe, Volcker has also been linked to a pro-UN lobby group, the United Nations Association of the United States (which happens to receive generous support from BNP Paribas). Critics are suggesting that the final report, expected in June, could end up being a whitewash."

This is a long and convoluted article but try to stay with it. The political connections mentioned in this story are very interesting, the companies seemed intertwined through politics and marriage. This will give you a very good idea why France didn't want Saddam out and even more surprising why Canada didn't either. Mr. Volcker really has to explain why he didn't mention his connection with some of the companies and people in this story. Perhaps Senator Coleman and his investigating committee can ask the questions. The United Nations is a dangerous organization, this article points out several reasons that is to the detriment of the United States to still be a member. Ron

Kojo Annan still busy as a bee.

More on Louise Frechette

John R. Bolton next Ambassador to UN

More mismanagement found

The trail leads higher than Sevan

With U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan (search) next up for review by Paul Volcker’s inquiry into the Oil-for-Food scandal, a crucial question is whether Volcker will expand upon information tying the scandal directly to the U.N. chief’s office — by way of Annan’s second-in command, Louise Frechette (search).

Four years into the seven-year Oil-for-Food (search) program, with graft and mismanagement by then rampant, Frechette intervened directly by telephone to stop United Nations auditors from forwarding their investigations to the U.N. Security Council. This detail was buried on page 186 of the 219-page interim report Volcker’s Independent Inquiry Committee released Feb. 3.

U.N. Deputy Secretary-General Louise Frechette

LOUISE FRÉCHETTE

The other players

7 Year Old Girl raped by UN Peace keeper

Dileep Nair tried to tip off Security Council

Immunity not lifted yet by Kofi

For $1, Sevan gets immunity

The suspended U.N. head of the scandal-tainted oil-for-food program in Iraq has asked the United Nations for more time to answer a list of charges made against him, a U.N. spokesman said on Wednesday.
He was accused of steering an Iraq oil allocation to a relative of Boutros Boutros-Ghali, the U.N. secretary-general from 1991 to 1996. The relative, who owned a small Panamanian-registered trading company, earned $1.5 million from the transaction.

Sevan is retired and receives $1 a year but retains his diplomatic immunity until Annan lifts it. The arrangement was made so he would cooperate with Volcker's probe, which will be completed in mid-year.

UN finally to investigate rape charges of 12 year olds

More rapes than first thought, says UN

Another black mark against the UN

King Kofi's UN paid $1.4 Billion

2.2% paid to UN right off the top of Billions

Volcker's recent interim report--there is another interim one expected soon and a final report due out this summer--does not even begin to address the true dimensions of Oil-for-Food, in which the United Nations oversaw more than $110 billion of Saddam's business transactions while Saddam racked up sanctions-busting illicit income estimated at anywhere from $9 to $17 billion. The emerging picture is that Oil-for-Food was the largest scam in the history of humanitarian relief. And the big questions are: Who at the United Nations might be to blame? And what needs fixing? 

To cover its costs for overseeing the program, the Secretariat collected 2.2 percent of the revenue on every barrel of oil sold, amounting to $1.4 billion over the life of the program (plus another 0.8 percent, or $500 million, to pay for weapons inspections that ceased in late 1998, when Saddam stopped cooperating with them). This meant that Annan--who was secretary-general for all but the first month of the program--did not have to petition member-states for donations to run Oil-for-Food

Saddam was increasingly treated as an esteemed businessman rather than as a tyrant needing close supervision. The United Nations from the start let Saddam choose to whom he would sell oil and decide what goods Iraqis needed, subject to U.N. approval. The Secretariat, which retained records of Saddam's transactions, kept critical details of the deals secret, including the names of his business partners and the prices paid for relief supplies.

Peacekeepers or predators?

Time to retire like Mr. Sevan

Raped by UN as young as 12 years old

Oil-for-Food Chief Said to Block Audit

Benon Sevan wouldn't allow audit

The U.N. oil-for-food program chief under scrutiny for alleged corruption and mismanagement blocked a proposed audit of his office around the same time he's accused of soliciting lucrative oil deals from Iraq, according to investigators.

A U.N. auditing team, which was severely understaffed, said running the $64 billion oil-for-food program was "a high risk activity" and a priority for review. But Benon Sevan denied the internal auditors' request to hire a consultant to examine his office in May 2001 - an act top investigators of the program are now calling into question.

More on UN Pedeophilia

Googlism

This blog is now number one for Google search on "Benon Sevan."

Good work, Ron!

Benan Sevan to be fall guy

200 pages of smoke and mirrors

The report found that Benon Sevan (search) broke the rules by allegedly trying to obtain oil vouchers from Saddam Hussein's regime in Iraq. Sevan has been accused of receiving about $1 million worth of lucrative oil vouchers but he has denied any wrongdoing.

NBC Reporter Was on U.N. Lobby Payroll.

Legal smuggling by Turkey and Jordan?

Where's Kofi? Smokescreen for UN started?

Paul Volkers article in the WSJ

Today, the Independent Inquiry Committee into the United Nation's Oil for Food Program is issuing its first Interim Report. Much more work lies ahead in thoroughly investigating the full range of issues raised in the administration and implementation of that Program. The Committee's intention is to provide a comprehensive report around midyear.

Today's Report is limited, but covers in almost excruciating detail three potentially vulnerable parts of the Program's administration: More disheartening are our findings with respect to the performance of the Executive Director in administrative charge of the Program, Benon Sevan, a long-term senior United Nations official. The evidence is conclusive that Mr. Sevan, in effectively participating in the selection of purchasers of oil under the Program, placed himself in an irreconcilable conflict of interest, in violation both of specific United Nations rules and of the broad responsibility of an international civil servant to adhere to the highest standards of trust and integrity.In making its findings, the Committee is consciously judging the United Nations against the highest standard of ethical behavior. Moreover, we believe that few institutions have freely subjected themselves to the intensity of scrutiny entailed in the Committee's work.

If the United Nations is to effectively discharge the enormous responsibilities that have been placed upon it by member states, no lesser criteria for our investigation are appropriate.

The new humanitarian crisis in the Indian Ocean is but another demonstration of the need for a truly effective international organization -- an organization that can command the confidence of member states and the citizens of the world alike.

To read the full article in the Wall Street Journal you must be a paid subscriber.

The "crisis in the Indian Ocean"

You forgot Kojo"

Kojo admits

Don't Let Volcker Report Whitewash U.N. Oil-For-Food Scandal

Volcker whitewash expected because of hidden affiliations.

U.S. policy-makers shouldn’t stand by while a committee compromised by conflicts of interest clears a secretary-general of faulty oversight and allows a group of U.N. officials to escape overall responsibility for the biggest financial fraud of modern times. [see preceding Dr. Gardiner article, Ron]

With Annan’s job and the image of the organization he heads hanging in the balance, this is no time for a whitewash, Gardiner says. To that end, Gardiner proposes:
• Bringing transparency to the IIC’s operations. Identify all 60 people working on or with the committee, complete with all of their prior affiliations.
• Publicly disclosing all interviews between the IIC and U.N. officials and all findings from the committee.
• Furnishing monthly updates on IIC activities and progress to Security Council members.
• Setting and honoring a date for publication of the final IIC report to remove the timing of its release from U.N. political manipulation.
• Forcing the U.N. to make all of its personnel who were involved in the Oil-For-Food program, as well as all relevant documents, available to the various committees of the U.S. Congress that have opened investigations.

Volcker conpromised?

Smoke Screen to start soon

The Volcker Investigation into the U.N. Oil-for-Food Scandal: Why It Lacks Credibility

Lots of problems say's Dr. Gardiner of Heritage

Annan is facing growing calls for his resignation from Capitol Hill, where Senator Norm Coleman (R– MN), chairman of the Senate Permanent Subcommit­tee on Investigations, and 60 Members of Congress have called for Annan to step down.2 Among them are nine members of the House Appropriations Com­mittee, which provides 22 percent of the U.N. oper­ating budget each year, and eight members of the House International Relations Committee.3 Several more Senators are expected to support Coleman’s call for Annan’s departure.[1][2][3]

In addition, the Bush Administration has begun to harden its stance toward Annan. Outgoing Sec­retary of State Colin Powell warned the embattled Secretary-General that he will be held accountable for management failures in the Oil-for-Food pro­gram.[4] President George W. Bush has so far refused to express his confidence in Annan, declining to meet with him in December when the Secretary-General visited Washington.

Outside the oil-for-food scandal, Annan’s prob­lems are also mounting. He has acknowledged and accepted organizational responsibility for a major scandal involving U.N. personnel and peacekeep­ers in the Congo. The U.N. stands accused of human rights violations against refugees on a scale that dwarfs the Abu Ghraib scandal. In addition, internal unrest within the U.N. continues to mount in the wake of a series of harassment scan­dals involving senior U.N. managers. The threat of a U.N. staff revolt looms large. If 2004 was Kofi Annan’s “annus horribilis,” 2005 threatens to be even worse.

UN's oil-for-food aid probe due

This is so funny now

Questions for Mr. Sevan

What is going on here?

Benon Sevan, the United Nations official in charge of the oil-for-food programme in Iraq, intervened in person to steer lucrative contracts to an oil trader, Iraqi officials have told the UN's independent inquiry.

Their testimony, consistent with documents that have emerged since the fall of Saddam Hussein, adds to questions facing Mr Sevan as investigations into alleged corruption progresses. The interim findings of the UN inquiry, led by Paul Volcker, are due to be published this week.

Documents from Iraq's state oil marketing organisation (Somo) in the possession of the Financial Times and Il Sole 24 Ore, the Italian business daily, appear to link Mr Sevan to the assigning of contracts to Africa Middle East Petroleum, a Swiss-based oil trading company. Oil contracts - which could be sold to international traders at a mark-up of up to 35 cents a barrel - were awarded by the regime at the start of every six-month phase. The Somo documents show that, unusually, AMEP was added to recipients in the middle of Phase Four (May 1998-November 1998) after a visit to Baghdad by Mr Sevan.

One letter, dated August 10 1998, was from Saddam Zayn Hassan, Somo's executive manager, to Iraq's oil minister. It mentions AMEP as "the company that Mr Sevan cited to you during his last trip to Baghdad".

African Middle East Petroleum Co.

Look at Panama

Who is Mr. Sevan?

Why did Kofi go to Moscow

How does this all fit in

While Paul Volcker, who leads the Oil-For-Food probe, has been investigating Annan in the comfort of his own Turtle Bay office, ex-KGB spymeister, Primakov remains under the probe’s radar screen but Volcker, Benon Sevan, the original "senior UN official" in the Oil-For-Food program, and Primakov share something in common: all three were handpicked for their individual roles by Kofi Annan.

The mainline media has finally picked up on what Fox News calls Paul Volcker’s "potentially too-close-for-comfort ties to companies he’s supposed to be investigating."

Meanwhile, the five Capitol Hill panels conducting investigations into the Oil-For-Food program, some of whom are now admitting a concern about Volcker creating at least an appearance of impropriety as far as potential conflicts of interests are concerned, should be checking out former KGB spymeister Yevgeny Primakov.

KGB code name:Maxim

Check the names out

Hat tip to Jeff M., more on General Primakov

Cotecna pays Kojo Annan

How it worked

Robert Massey, CEO of Cotecna Inspection SA, responds to some of the serious questions that have been raised about his firm's performance in overseeing the U.N.-administered oil-for-food program in Iraq.

From 1995 to 1997, Kojo Annan, the son of embattled U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan, was employed at Cotecna, which had been inspecting humanitarian goods imported by Iraq with U.N.-administered proceeds from its oil sales. He served as a consultant until 1998. U.N. officials had claimed that that's when the payments from Cotecna to Kojo stopped. Then, in November, we learned that the payments had not ended in 1998 after all. In fact, Kojo Annan continued to receive up to $2,500 a month from Cotecna until February 2003 as part of a "no compete" agreement.

Very smart guy

Great business man

Kojo say's wasn't me

Kojo Annan Admits Oil Dealing

Times Online - Sunday Times

THE son of the United Nations secretary-general has admitted he was involved in negotiations to sell millions of barrels of Iraqi oil under the auspices of Saddam Hussein.

Kojo Annan has told a close friend he became involved in negotiations to sell 2m barrels of Iraqi oil to a Moroccan company in 2001. He is understood to be co-operating with UN investigators probing the discredited oil for food programme.

The alleged admission will increase pressure on Kofi Annan, the UN secretary general, who is already facing calls for his resignation over the management of the humanitarian programme.

The Volcker Oil-for-Food Investigation: Is There a Conflict of Interest?

Why wasn't this disclosed, why??

Paul Volcker and an Apparent Conflict of Interest

It should be an issue of concern that Mr. Volcker’s own outlook may be influenced by past associations. It is vitally important that any independent inquiry into the extremely serious allegations leveled against the United Nations—which could have far-reaching implications for the reputation of the world organization—be seen as completely independent of the U.N. It is just as important that the person charged with heading such an inquiry be seen as completely unbiased and objective in his approach toward the organization he is investigating. In the corporate world, for example, it would be inconceivable for an independent inquiry into fraud and corruption to be headed by someone with strong ties and loyalties to the corporation under investigation.

But in the case of Paul Volcker and the Independent Inquiry Committee, there is an apparent conflict of interest that brings into question whether the Committee can objectively investigate the United Nations. When Volcker was appointed to head the Oil-for-Food investigation in April 2004, it was not widely known to the general public, the world’s media, or the U.S. Congress that he was at the time a director of the United Nations Association of the United States of America (UNA-USA) and the Business Council for the United Nations. Mr. Volcker is listed as a director in the 2003-2004 UNA-USA annual report,[3] as well as the annual reports for 2001-2002 and 2000-2001.[4]The UNA-USA’s partner organization, the Business Council for the United Nations (BCUN), works to “advance the common interests of the U.N. and business in a more prosperous and peaceful world.” One of its chief underwriters was BNP Paribas, the French bank that held the escrow account for Oil-for-Food funds.[9] BNP donated more than $100,000 to UNA-USA and BCUN in 2002 to 2003.[10] BNP’s role in the Oil-for-Food scandal is currently being investigated by the House International Relations Committee,[11] as well as by the Volcker Committee.

More conflict of interest?

Smoke and mirrors?

More on BNP Paribas

More on Kofi's Intervention

Heritage Policy Weblog

One worrying trend that has developed over Kofi Annan's tenure as Secretary-General of the United Nations has been the organization's increasing attention to and involvement in American politics. As a politically neutral international organization, in theory, all American politicians should be equal allies, whether they be Democrat or Republican. But the truth is, sadly, that some are now more equal than others at the UN.

The suspicious timing of a release of information from the UN's IAEA in October led Nile Gardiner to wonder whether the UN had finally abandoned any vestigial appearance of neutrality to actively meddle in U.S. politics. Though his evidence was circumstantial, Gardiner made a convincing case that the IAEA likely leaked materials potentially damaging to the Bush reelection effort to a newspaper and television network immediately prior to the election, when the Bush campaign would find it difficult to answer the questions raised.

As we have described many times, Annan ratcheted up his rhetoric against the U.S. administration during the election buildup, seemingly doing his bit to affect the U.S. electoral outcome. Though Annan's (apparent) candidate did not win, it isn't difficult to imagine that his constant stream of criticism of the U.S. president and his conduct of the war in Iraq managed to sway some votes. Once an international diplomat, Annan refashioned himself a political surrogate.

Annan Aide Quits

Iqbal Riza Retires Abruptly Amid U.N. Scandal

One of the biggest power players at the United Nations abruptly announced his retirement yesterday in what may signal the beginning of a Turtle Bay shake-up, just one day after Secretary-General Annan said that the scandals and attacks from outsiders had "cast a shadow" on the institution.

In an announcement that surprised even the U.N. spokesman, Fred Eckhard, who made it at a regular press briefing after a note was passed to him from upstairs, Mr. Annan said that he accepted a request from his chief of staff, Iqbal Riza, to retire "with very mixed emotions." His retirement will take effect on January 15, Mr. Annan said in the statement.

Many diplomats at the United Nations said yesterday they believe the departure of Mr. Riza was the result of American pressure on Mr. Annan, who recently visited Washington in an attempt to mend fences with the Bush administration.

Relations were harmed after Mr. Annan's famous pronouncements on the Iraq war, which he called "illegal," and his advice, on the eve of the presidential election, against an attack on Fallujah. Many in Washington are also incensed about a host of scandals at the organization, which receives 22% of its operating budget from America.

DLC Calls for Annan's Resignation

New Dem Daily - The Price of Credibility

As we argued last week, one of America's most urgent foreign policy needs is to retool international organizations and traditional alliances to provide collective security against the global threat of jihadist terrorism. The United Nations can and should be a central part of this new collective security system, but only if the organization is systematically reformed to serve that purpose.

Unfortunately, the United Nations' credibility has been steadily eroded by its own misdeeds, with a burgeoning scandal over its incompetent and sometimes corrupt management of the Iraq oil-for-food program being the most damaging example. Last week it was reported that the son of U.N. secretary general Kofi Annan received a series of payments from a Swiss firm that won a lucrative contract under the oil-for-food program. This development has fed growing doubts that the United Nations will be able to own up to its problems or reform its operations so long as Annan remains at the helm. ...

The secretary general should place this critical mission ahead of his personal interests, and step aside. Given his own lack of credibility on the oil-for-food program, this step is the price Annan must pay to help restore the U.N.'s credibility, and to salvage his legacy as secretary general.

Read the whole thing.

Hat tip: Instapundit

NY Times Defends Kofi Annan

The NYT editorial begins thus:

The assault on the United Nations is escalating. A Senate subcommittee has raised the estimate of how many illegal billions Saddam Hussein was able to amass under the noses of monitors hired by the United Nations. Several other Congressional committees are exploring the scandal. Norm Coleman, the subcommittee's Republican chairman, has joined a gaggle of conservatives calling for the resignation of Secretary General Kofi Annan.

Blogger Tigerhawk has fisked this editorial thoroughly:

Make no mistake about it: The New York Times is proposing a defense of Kofi Annan's administration, hoping to deflect "political momentum" that might lead to his defenestration removal from office. It is trying to accomplish this by redefining the accusation against Kofi Annan's United Nations. Until now, the criticism of the oil-for-food program is that it involved the payment of bribes by Saddam in the form of "vouchers" that would allow the recipients to buy oil from Iraq at prices below the prevailing market rate. The beneficiaries of the vouchers profited from the spread between the Iraqi price and the world price for the oil.

The scandal is that many of the recipients of the oil-for-food bribes were in a position to influence the governments of France and Russia to take positions in Security Council deliberations that would favor Saddam. Saddam was exploiting the oil-for-food program to buy influence. The Times is now trying to argue that it is all a tempest in a teapot because most of Saddam's ill-gotten gains came via smuggling through Iraq's neighbors, among them putative allies of the United States. But the oil-for-food scandal is not primarily about the lining of Saddam's pockets -- it's about the manipulation of, and therefore the legitimacy of, Security Council decisions.

Read Tigerhawk's entry. He incorporates the entire editorial, and takes it apart, piece by piece.

Update - Annan Dodges Bullet On No-Confidence Vote

Fox News - U.N. Staff: 'No Confidence' in Top Leaders

UNITED NATIONS — A union representing United Nations staff has voted "no confidence" in senior management but stopped short of singling out Secretary-General Kofi Annan.

The vote is largely symbolic and has no effect over any U.N. officials' jobs. But it isn’t a good sign for the top leaders' effectiveness as heads of the world body.

...

Union members said the vote wasn’t directed at Annan but at the management of several top officials. In fact, the head of the labor organization said members actually did have confidence in Annan himself.

"We not only have confidence in him, we support him fully," said U.N. Staff Union President Rosemarie Waters on Friday after the no-confidence vote passed. "He is in a very difficult job under very difficult circumstances, but we continue to have hope that he is doing his best. We only want his senior managers to exhibit the transparency and accountability that he has prescribed for the organization."

(Full article at link.)

BREAKING- Kofi Annan To Face No-Confidence Vote

Yahoo/AFP - UN staff ready historic no-confidence vote in Annan

UNITED NATIONS (AFP) - UN employees are expected to issue an unprecedented vote of no confidence in Secretary-General Kofi Annan, union sources say, after he pardoned the body's top oversight official over a series of allegations.

The UN staff union, in what officials said was the first vote of its kind in the more than 50-year history of the United Nations, was set to approve a resolution withdrawing support for the embattled Annan and senior UN management.

...

Staffers said the trigger for the no-confidence measure was an announcement this week that Annan had pardoned the UN's top oversight official, who was facing allegations of favouritism and sexual harassment.

...

The latest crisis comes as Annan faces unprecedented calls to resign over the burgeoning scandal about "oil-for-food," a UN aid scheme that US investigators say allowed Saddam to siphon off billions of dollars.

The programme has tainted longtime UN officials like Benon Sevan, who oversaw the operation and is now accused of pocketing Saddam's money in exchange for turning a blind eye to the Iraqi dictator's abuses.

(Full article at link.)

Annan faces questions on oil-for-food

Kofi Annan's Role in UNSCAM

THE ROLE of Kofi Annan in the Iraqi oil-for-food scandal is to be investigated after it emerged that the United Nations secretary-general was in charge of some of the most controversial aspects of the discredited humanitarian programme.

Annan, 66, the Ghanaian-born head of the UN and Nobel peace prize winner
who is due to retire in 2006, is ³co-operating² with the independent
commission set up to look into the scandal. He has agreed to waive his
diplomatic immunity and face legal action if any wrongdoing is uncovered.

Annan played a key role in the design and operation of the scheme.

Although there is no suggestion that he personally benefited from the
programme, his actions may have helped others, including Saddam Hussein, the
former Iraqi leader, to defraud the oil-for-food scheme.

More at link. Thanks to Ron Norman.

La République des Bananes

Kofi Annan tries to explain away France and Russia's Oil for Food
wrongdoing.

BY CLAUDIA ROSETT

Kofi Annan, secretary-general of the United Nations, finds it "inconceivable" that Russia, France or China might have been influenced in Security Council debates by Saddam Hussein's Oil for Food business and bribes. "These are very serious and important governments," Mr. Annan told Britain's ITV News Sunday. "You are not dealing with banana republics."

This has been Mr. Annan's chief response so far to the extensive documentation cited in the recent Iraq Survey Group report, from the CIA's Charles Duelfer, that under cover of the U.N.'s Oil for Food relief program Saddam was trying to buy up pals on the U.N. Security Council. Mr. Duelfer tells us that under the leaky U.N. sanctions and corrupt Oil for Food program, Saddam had already built the networks and was amassing the resources to rearm himself with weapons of mass destruction as soon as U.N. sanctions were entirely gone.

With the aim of shedding sanctions, Saddam, according to his regime's own records, was throwing billions in business and millions in bribes to France, Russia and, to a lesser extent, China, all veto-wielding permanent members of the Security Council. As it happened, sanctions were indeed eroding, and these three nations opposed the decision of the U.S. and Britain that Saddam either had to shape up or be shipped out.

But in Mr. Annan's view, Saddam's oil money had nothing to do with it. Nobody buys the officials of France, Russia and China. They are serious and mportant.

(more at link, thanks to Ron Norman)

Kofi Annan's Shrinking Credibility

Annan's Shrinking Credibility

U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan's latest interview with British television, in which he dismissed the serious allegations of Oil-for-Food improprieties raised in the Duelfer Report, undermines his credibility and impartiality with regard to the Oil-for-Food investigation.[1] Moreover, Annan's remarks reinforce concerns over his own failure of leadership relating to the U.N.¹s administration of the Oil-for-Food program and cast serious doubt over his suitability to remain in office while the scandal is investigated. In addition, Annan¹s controversial statements regarding the Iraq war have further undermined his supposedly neutral position as the world¹s most senior servant of the international community. Annan should step down as Secretary-General while the Oil-for-Food investigation proceeds.

Annan and Oil for Food

In an extraordinary intervention, Kofi Annan attacked the conclusions
contained in the Iraq Survey Group Report (the Duelfer Report)[2] regarding
Saddam Hussein¹s weapons of mass destruction program. Annan firmly rejected
accusations in the report that Saddam attempted to bribe members of the U.N.
Security Council through the Oil-for-Food program:

I don't think the Russian or the French or the Chinese government would
allow itself to be bought because some of his companies are getting relative
contracts of the Iraqi authorities. I don't believe that at all. I think
it's inconceivable, these are very serious and important governments. You
are not dealing with banana republics.[3]

These remarks on the Duelfer Report are breathtaking in their arrogance and
are a blatant demonstration of the Secretary General¹s bias in favor of
those nations that had opposed the removal of Saddam Hussein from power.

Annan's comments are all the more remarkable for the fact that they were
made against the backdrop of the biggest scandal in U.N. history, the
ill-fated Oil-for-Food program, now the subject of at least four
congressional investigations, three U.S. federal investigations, as well as
a U.N.-appointed commission of inquiry, the Volcker Commission.[4] In a
recent development, the U.S. Department of Justice is investigating the role
of Kojo Annan, Kofi's son, in connection to his role as a paid consultant to
Cotecna Inspection SA, a Swiss-based company that received a contract for
inspecting goods shipped to Iraq under the Oil-for-Food program.[5]

(more at link, hat tip to reader Ron Norman)

Sevan To Face Congressional Inquiry

Telegraph - UN oil for food chief faces inquiry into property deals

American prosecutors are preparing charges against Benon Sevan, the former head of the United Nations oil for food programme, who has been accused of accepting millions of dollars in kickbacks from Saddam Hussein's regime.

Congressional investigators examining alleged corruption in the programme disclosed that Mr Sevan's diplomatic immunity would not prevent an indictment being issued. Mr Sevan has consistently denied any wrongdoing.

"We have tried to find out what part he had and we've been working to lift the lid on what he did," said one official on the US Congress International Relations committee. "My understanding is that we can indict him without lifting diplomatic immunity. That's what we did with Noriega."

...

Former officials in Iraq's state oil company, Somo, have alleged to investigators reporting to the International Relations committee that Mr Sevan was "sacked" on Saddam's orders in 2001 for failing to keep promises to campaign on ending sanctions.

"The basic understanding of these officials is that Saddam felt short-changed by this guy who took the money but did not deliver," said one committee staffer.

(Full article at link.)

Oil Officials Claim U.N. Inspector Took O.F.F. Bribes

The Telegraph - UN inspector 'took £60,000 Iraq bribes'

Iraqi oil officials have accused a United Nations inspector of taking almost £60,000 in bribes from Saddam Hussein's regime as his henchmen and foreign business partners siphoned millions from the UN's oil-for-food programme, it was reported yesterday.

An inquiry by officials in the State Oil Marketing Organisation - a body which, under Saddam, was a key player in schemes that allegedly diverted billions in oil revenues from the UN-run programme - accused an inspector contracted through the Dutch company Saybolt of falsifying documents in return for bribes, the Wall Street Journal reported.

...

Senior executives from Cotecna and Saybolt were yesterday summoned before the United States Congress to help to explain how Saddam managed to divert money from the oil-for-food programme. The witnesses also included a senior manager from BNP Paribas, the French bank that controlled the escrow accounts into which oil revenues were paid.

Cotecna, Saybolt and BNP Paribas deny any wrongdoing. Saybolt told the Wall Street Journal: "Our inquiries both at the time and subsequently do not confirm the allegations of a bribe. But we're prepared to look into it further, given the new details."

(Full article at link. Hat-tip to Captain Ed.)

Another Leaked Document Points To U.N. Buyoff

The Sunday Times - Saddam ‘bought UN allies’ with oil

A LEAKED report has exposed the extent of alleged corruption in the United Nations’ oil-for-food scheme in Iraq, identifying up to 200 individuals and companies that made profits running into hundreds of millions of pounds from it.

The report largely implicates France and Russia, whom Saddam Hussein targeted as he sought support on the UN Security Council before the Iraq war. Both countries were influential voices against UN-backed action.

A senior UN official responsible for the scheme is identified as a major beneficiary. The report, marked “highly confidential”, also finds that the private office of Vladimir Putin, the Russian president, profited from the cheap oil. Saddam’s regime awarded this oil during the run-up to the war when military action was being discussed at the UN.

The report was drawn up on behalf of the interim Iraqi government in preparation for a possible legal action against those who may have illicitly profited under Saddam. The Iraqis hired the London-based accountants KPMG and lawyers Freshfields to advise on future action.

...

The other main allegations included in the report are that:

Benon Sevan, director of the UN oil-for-food programme, received 9.3m barrels of oil from the regime which he is estimated to have sold for a profit of £670,000. Sevan has always denied any improper conduct.

A former senior aide to Putin allegedly organised the sale of almost 4m barrels of oil at a profit of more than £330,000. At the time the oil was sold, Russia was blocking the UN from supporting America’s demands to attack Iraq. According to the report, the aide, who worked in the presidential office, received 3.9m barrels of oil between May and December 2002.

In the two months during the run-up to the war, the Iraqi regime illegally sold about £30m of oil to a Jordanian-based company with the money deposited in a Jordanian bank account established by the regime. This is suspected to have been an attempt to secure safe passage for Saddam’s family in the event of war.

A French oil company teamed up with the regime to bribe a UN-appointed inspector monitoring exports of Iraqi oil. The inspector, a Portuguese national working for Saybolt, a Dutch firm, was paid a total of £58,000 in cash to forge export documents.

The French firm is linked to a close associate of Jacques Chirac, the country’s president. A spokesman for Saybolt said it would be investigating the allegations.

Saddam imposed a surcharge of between 10 cents and 50 cents (5p to 27p) for every barrel of oil allocated by his regime between September 2000 and the end of 2002.

The money raised from this illegal surcharge was deposited in bank accounts in Jordan, Lebanon, Iraq and the United Arab Emirates. Iraqi embassies, including those in Moscow, Athens, Cairo, Rome, Vienna and Geneva, collected the money.

We'll be on the lookout for a copy of the official document.

(Full article at link. Thanks again to Ron Norman.)

Investigators Hope For More UN Transparancy As A Result Of Scandal Investigation

ABC News - U.S. Hopes to Lift U.N. Veil of Secrecy

NEW YORK Oct. 2, 2004 — U.S. investigators working in parallel to a U.N.-commissioned probe into allegations of corruption in its oil-for-food program said they hope to use public hearings to lift a curtain of secrecy obscuring the United Nations' finances and management.

While congressional investigators have demanded for months that the head of the independent U.N. inquiry, former Fed chairman Paul Volcker, release records from internal U.N audits, they now say they will use the probe to push for more openness and broader U.N. reform.

"Democratic institutions only work when their work is done in front of the public eye. I'm a huge supporter of the U.N., but they must become more transparent," Rep. Christopher Shays, R-Conn., who is conducting one of the hearings, said in a statement to The Associated Press.

(Full article at link. Thanks again to Ron Norman.)

Top U.N. Officials Turned A Blind Eye To O.F.F. Problems

NY Post - HOUSE REPORT RIPS U.N. ON OIL-FOR-FOOD

October 2, 2004 -- WASHINGTON — A congressional report yesterday blasted top U.N. officials for lax oversight of the Iraq oil-for-food program, charging that warnings from its own inspectors that Saddam Hussein was scamming the program were ignored by top U.N. officials.

The bombshell report prepared by the House Government Reform Subcommittee on National Security charges that two companies hired by the United Nations to police shipments of goods going in and out of Iraq have complained that they lacked the authority to adequately do their job and stop the massive smuggling scams.

...

The two companies hired by the U.N., Cotecna S.A. and Saybolt International, "raised occasional concerns about the ability to carry out their duties and possible corruption," the report said.

"However, many of these concerns appear to have fallen on deaf ears at the U.N., or at least confused ears, as various offices gave ambiguous responses to the contractors," the report said.

Nice to hear from Saybolt and Cotecna again. Although, this just makes their involvement in the scandal that much curiouser.

(Full article at link. Thanks to Ron Norman.)

Harvard Professor Opines on O.F.F. Scandal, U.N. Impact

LA Times: With Eye Toward Legacy, Annan Grasps for Order

The U.N.'s moral high ground was undermined this year by a brewing scandal over the "oil-for-food" program that allowed Iraq, under U.N. sanctions in the 1990s, to sell oil to buy humanitarian goods. Allegations that Hussein pocketed $10 billion through the program to rebuild his palaces and reinforce his army have been distracting and damaging for Annan, who waited months before responding to them.

The U.N.'s administration of the program, which concentrated on delivering goods rather than investigating reported kickbacks and corruption, is the subject of several inquiries, including an internal probe.

The Security Council has also been attacked for setting up a program that protected member countries' economic interests without ensuring accountability.

" 'Oil-for-food' is an enormous negative for the U.N.," [Harvard Human Rights Professor Michael] Ignatieff said. "The credibility of a decade of U.N. inspection, patiently accrued to the U.N., was thrown away by the incompetence and corruption of the … program. There's no doubt it's a catastrophe for the U.N.'s moral credibility."

A small mention, but significant nonetheless.

(Full article at link.)

New York Times Points Out Bureaucratic Failures Which Led To Oil-For-Food Scandal

New York Times: Under Eye of U.N., Billions for Hussein in Oil-for-Food Plan

Since the fall of Mr. Hussein, the oil-for-food program has received far more scrutiny than it ever did during its six years of operation. Congress's Government Accountability Office, formerly the General Accounting Office, has estimated that the Iraqi leader siphoned at least $10 billion from the program by illicitly trading in oil and collecting kickbacks from companies that had United Nations approval to do business with Iraq. Multiple investigations now under way in Washington and Iraq and at the United Nations all center on one straightforward question: How did Mr. Hussein amass so much money while under international sanctions? An examination of the program, the largest in the United Nations' history, suggests an equally straightforward answer: The United Nations let him do it.

"Everybody said it was a terrible shame and against international law, but there was really no enthusiasm to tackle it," said Peter van Walsum, a Dutch diplomat who headed the Iraq sanctions committee in 1999 and 2000, recalling the discussions of illegal oil surcharges. "We never had clear decisions on anything. So we just in effect condoned things."

Surprisingly, considering the source, this is one of the most well-written, informative, and rather damning articles on the Oil-For-Food scandal that I've read in a while. If you read just one article about this whole mess, read this one.

(Full article at link. Thanks to Ron Norman.)

U.N. Got Blunt Oil-For-Food Bribery Letter

U.N. Got Blunt Oil-For-Food Bribery Letter

UNITED NATIONS — United Nations officials apparently knew of specific allegations that bribes were being paid in the oil-for-food program but there's no sign they did anything to change the program, documents obtained by FOX News show.

Nearly two years ago, U.N. official Benon Sevan (search) — the man who ran the oil-for-food program — received a copy of a letter from Lakia (search), a Russian-owned oil company, that was sent to Iraqi authorities.

The Oct. 2, 2002, letter was blunt and direct. It accused the State Oil Marketing Organization (search) of "lying to us."

"It is necessary for us to ask the immediate reimbursement of the sum of $60,000 which was sent to you from us on your request for a so-called necessary advance payment," said the letter, written by Gazi Luguev, Lakia's president.

[... more at link]

Via: Captain's Quarters

Benon Sevan Criticizes Security Council

Former OFP Director Criticizes Security Council

The former head of the United Nations' oil-for-food program in Iraq says the Security Council prevented him from effectively administering the multibillion-dollar-a-year program that is now the focus of several inquiries into allegations of corruption and mismanagement.
Benon V. Sevan, the former executive director of the United Nations' Office of Iraq Programs, defended the program and blamed the Council members for its many problems in an e-mail message sent Friday. A copy of his message, addressed to "My Dear Friend," was sent to The New York Times by a recipient who, along with other United Nations officials, vouched for its authenticity.

A recent report by the General Accounting Office in Washington accused Saddam Hussein's government of having pocketed more than $10 billion from the six-year oil-for-food program, which used Iraqi oil sales to pay for food, medicine and other goods between 1997 and 2002. In February, a document from Iraqi ministries reportedly cited Mr. Sevan as having received oil allotments himself. Mr. Sevan denied the charges in a written statement, but declined to discuss the issue publicly.
The e-mail message to what one United Nations official called Mr. Sevan's "inner circle" ...

(more at link)

Benon Sevan Vs. Fox News

Ex-Oil-for-Food Head Defiant to Questions

Fox News describes Mr. Benon Sevan in a recent impromptu interview as "defiant." From the article:

NEW YORK — The former head of the United Nation's oil-for-food program, Benon Sevan (search), on Sunday insisted to Fox News that he was innocent of the corruption claims against him.

A Fox News reporter approached Sevan in Manhattan and asked him several questions, including whether allegations against him were true. Sevan would only refer the reporter to an earlier statement the U.N. released in his name and said he was not giving interviews on the topic.

"Listen, I want to tell you something — first, I don't interview anymore," Sevan told Fox News' Eric Shawn. "You know me, I'm never shy with the press. I made my statement February 10. I stand by it. I'm looking forward to meet[ing] with the members of the panel. Thank you."

...

Asked by Fox News "Will you cooperate with authorities?", Sevan responded, "Of course I will cooperate."

When asked "Will you give your bank records over to the investigators?", Sevan replied, "I speak only to the panel, not to you."

Sevan refused to say whether or not he would give up diplomatic immunity during the investigation. U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan (search) said he would strip diplomats of immunity if they were found guilty of wrongdoing.

Sevan added that in America, one is innocent before being proven guilty, that he was clearly unhappy with the media's coverage of the scandal and of himself and that he would respond only to the U.N. panel leading the investigation.

(full article at link)

Hmmm...Sevan was uncharacteristically forthcoming with the Telegraph in Greece four days ago, yet one day later in New York, he is "stonewalling" Fox News, if you will. What a difference a day makes.

Benon Sevan "Not Running Away"

UN official in oil for food scandal found

Benon Sevan, the official at the centre of the United Nations' oil-for-food scandal, has broken his silence to claim that he is being persecuted after an independent inquiry was ordered into allegations of multi-billion dollar corruption relating to the scheme.

Tracked down on Friday by The Sunday Telegraph to a five-star hotel in his native Cyprus, Mr Sevan said that he was being unfairly persecuted and vowed to "talk plenty" once the inquiry had reported back to the UN Secretary General, Kofi Annan.
In an emotional exchange, the UN Deputy Secretary General said he would establish his innocence.
"I am going back to America tomorrow morning - I am not running away," he said. "I will talk about this when it's all over. Please don't underestimate me."

When asked about Mr Sevan's whereabouts in recent weeks, the UN would say only that he was on holiday, pending his retirement in June at the age of 66. He is due to receive a £55,000 annual pension after serving the UN for 40 years.

Now, however, those plans have changed. According to UN officials contacted by The Sunday Telegraph last week, Mr Sevan will stay in office to co-operate with the inquiry by the former US Treasury Secretary, Paul Volcker.

In the deal struck with Mr Annan, Mr Sevan will continue for the next three months and be paid a token $1 (55p) a year as a consultant, while continuing to enjoy diplomatic immunity.

"We could extend it again, because Mr Sevan has assured us that he will co-operate fully with the inquiry," said a spokesman for the UN secretariat.

... (more at link)

More UN Letters

FOXNews.com U.N. Warns Oil-for-Food Companies on Documents

Fox News reports a third UN "check with us" letter. This one dated April 27 to an as-yet-unidentified company. Along with the April 2 letter to Cotecna and the April 14 letter to Saybolt, it is clear that the UN deliberately intends to stonewall this way. UN spokesmen this week have defended these letters.

UNITED NATIONS - The office of the senior U.N. official in charge of the scandal-plagued Iraqi oil-for-food program has sent letters to companies involved in the program telling them they should not hand over any documents or information without first clearing it with the United Nations.

According to the letters obtained by Fox News, the companies "should retain and safeguard" any documents related to the program and should provide them to U.N. officials upon request. The letters came from the office of Undersecretary-General Benon V. Sevan, though aides signed the letters on his behalf.

One of the letters was sent to a company called Cotecna Inspection S.A., which for five years had the job of authenticating all goods being shipped into Iraq under the oil-for-food program.
It's also the company that once employed the son of U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan. Annan has said his son Kojo stopped working for the company before the Cotecna contract was awarded.

The second letter,¹ dated April 27, was provided to Fox News with the company name hidden. The source who provided the letter said it was one of the hundreds of companies authorized to do business with the oil-for-food program.

Both letters — as well as a third one made public earlier this week to Saybolt Corp., an inspection agency hired by the United Nations to monitor the loading of Iraqi oil — remind the companies of their contractual confidentiality agreements. For example, the April 2 Cotecna letter says all documents and data "shall be the property of the United Nations, shall be treated as confidential and shall be delivered only to United Nations authorized officials."

¹I am not sure why Fox described this as the "second" letter. The article (and other news reports) make it clear that, so far, three such letters have been uncovered. The convoluted phrasing of the next sentence (on careful study) confirms this. "Both letters — as well as a third one made public earlier this week ..."

More UN Stonewalling

OpinionJournal - The Real World

Claudia Rosett reports that the UN sent another "clear it with us" letter, this one to Cotecna, the OFP import inspection firm, dated April 2. Tim Russert had already confronted Kofi Annan on the letter to Saybolt.

Both letters, to Saybolt and Cotecna, are signed on behalf of Mr. Sevan, each by a different member of Mr. Annan's staff. Mr. Sevan was on vacation, pending retirement, when they were drawn up. The letter to Cotecna was a pointed reminder of terms of the U.N. contracts with Cotecna, detailing that all documentation connected with Oil for Food "shall be the property of the United Nations, shall be treated as confidential and shall be delivered only to the United Nations authorized officials on completion of work under this contract."
In the letter to Saybolt, dated 12 days later, the message had become tougher and yet more detailed, telling the company that any requests for information not already public should be relayed to the U.N., including "the reason why it is being sought." The letter to Saybolt also made specific mention that if U.N. internal audit reports are asked for, "we would not agree to their release." These would be the same internal audits that the U.N. Secretariat--which administered the Oil for Food program--did not share with the Security Council and has refused to provide to Congress.
In other words, in the interval between March 19, when Mr. Annan finally conceded in the face of overwhelming evidence that the program might after all need investigating ...

... (more at link) via: Instapundit

U.N. BIGS 'SEAL' THE OIL DEALS

New York Post Online Edition: news

May 4, 2004 -- WASHINGTON - The United Nations yesterday threw up a stone wall in the oil-for-food scandal, insisting that contracts between the world body and private companies should not be turned over to investigators.
In a defiant move that has infuriated probers, Secretary-General Kofi Annan threw his support behind a letter from former oil-for-food head Benon Sevan to officials of a Dutch company that inspected Iraqi oil shipments. The letter directed the company not to hand over documents to congressional committees and other "governmental authorities."
Sevan's shocking April 14 letter sternly reminded the company, Saybolt International, that details of its contract with the United Nations are confidential "and we would not agree to their release."

... (more at link)

[Ed. - The "governmental authorities" must be Iraq's Governing Council. See previous entry.]

Hat tip, Nick at Patriot Paradox

UN to Iraq: Drop Dead

CNN.com - U.N. defends oil-for-food letter - May 3, 2004

UNITED NATIONS (CNN) -- The United Nations has defended a letter sent by the head of its Iraq oil-for-food program telling a contractor not to release any documents related to the program without first consulting it. The letter, sent April 14 by an aide on behalf of U.N. oil-for-food head Benon Sevan to the manager of the Dutch company Saybolt, asks the company "to maintain the confidentiality of documentation and information relating to its services in connection with the program." Saybolt was the independent inspection agency hired by the United Nations to monitor the loading of Iraq's crude oil at the two locations sanctioned by the program.

According to the letter, released Monday by the United Nations, a "governmental authority" had requested internal U.N. reports from Saybolt.

If the UN wants to play a key role in Iraq, impeding the IGC's investigation of the UN's complicity with Saddam seems like a poor way to build Iraq's confidence in that institution.

... (more at link)

Kofi Annan on Meet the Press

Meet the Press Transcript May 2

In the excerpts below, Russert notes a recent document in which Benon Sevan told a company not to cooperate with investigators unless they cleared it with him. Annan hemmed and hawed on that.

Russert also challenged him on OFP providing money for Uday Hussein; again Annan dodged.

Annan also said United Nations employees will be stripped of their immunity and be dealt with severely if a probe finds they were involved in OFP corruption.

Benon Sevan

MR. RUSSERT: Someone also very close to you has alleged involvement in this scandal. This is how The San Diego Union Tribune wrote about it. "What particularly troubles are revelations that several hundred individuals, political entities and companies from more than 45 countries profited from doing illicit business with Saddam, accepting his oil contracts and paying the murderous dictator secret kick-backs. That included, according to Iraqi Oil Minister records, U.N. Assistant Secretary General Benon Sevan, executive director of the oil-for-food program, who received a vouch for 11.5 million barrels of oil through the program, enough to turn a profit as much as $3.5 million."

Now, Mr. Sevan has denied that allegation.

SEC'Y-GEN. ANNAN: Yes, sir.

MR. RUSSERT: But NBC News has obtained this letter that was sent on his stationery on April 14. This is just two weeks ago. "I refer to your e-mail ... regarding a request by `a Governmental Authority' for reports ... relating to the Oil-for-Food Programme. ... While we understand Saybolt's"--that's a company--"desire to be cooperative with bodies looking into the Programme ... we would ask that Saybolt address any further requests for documentation or information concerning these matters to us ..."

So Mr. Sevan, who's being investigated, is telling a company that's also being investigated, "Don't cooperate with government authorities unless you clear it with me." Why is he still involved in the investigation?

SEC'Y-GEN. ANNAN: Right. No, I wasn't aware of this confess for--Benon has worked with the U.N. for several decades, and I will be surprised if he's guilty of these accusations. But what I think is not important. What is important is that the team led by Mr. Volker gets to the bottom of this.

I'm not sure if it was Benon who signed this--sent this message to Saybolt. But what we have done is we are protecting all the material for the investigation that's been handed over to the Volker Group. And Mr. Volker is very keen to safeguard all the documentation, not on only from the U.N. and the staff, but also some of the agents and contractors for them to cooperate. And so that sort of message may have gone from one of the--either our own internal services in assistance and at the request of the Volker Commission. I do not see why Benon would be involved sending a message like this. And, of course, as I said, this is news to me. And we will have to talk to him about it.

Uday

RUSSERT: ... As for sports, that was the favorite arena of Saddam's sadistic son Uday, already infamous for torturing Iraqi athletes."

That's a very serious charge that you, in effect, were propping up Saddam Hussein's regime with more than humanitarian assistance, but supporting his son, his son's athletic programs, and a whole lot of other ventures.

SEC'Y-GEN. ANNAN: I think these outrageous allegations, when you look at the program--first of all, we did bring to the Security Council's attention some of these discrepancies. In fact, in the area of oil, it was based on the U.N. inspectors' findings. We went to the council and said, "There's something going on here. There seems to be a scheme to enrich the regime." What the council did was to introduce retroactive pricing to try and beat the system. And I think it did make a difference. We also indicated to them on many occasions pricing differences for the council to act. And also, all these contracts we discussed with the Security Council 661 committee. [Then Annan recited all the good the program did.]

MR. RUSSERT: But do you believe the program may have gone too far in providing aid to Saddam's son, Uday?

SEC'Y-GEN. ANNAN: I don't think the intention was to provide aid to Saddam's son. I mean, one has to look at the totality of t