Buyers of Iraq U.N. oil may be implicated

[Judi Lynn]

Sunday, February 6, 2005 · Last updated 11:48 a.m. PT

Buyers of Iraq U.N. oil may be implicated

By SAM CAGE
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER

GENEVA -- Companies that bought Iraqi oil from traders who allegedly spent billions of dollars to bribe Saddam Hussein for contracts under the U.N. oil-for-food program now could be implicated in the vast web of corruption uncovered in the investigation by former Federal Reserve chairman Paul Volcker, a Swiss criminal lawyer told The Associated Press on Sunday.

The alleged payoffs to win Iraqi contracts amounted to as much as $2.5 billion, Mark Pieth said in an AP interview.

"We are trying to find out who paid the surcharges eventually," said Pieth, one of three commission members leading a probe into allegations of corruption in the program. Volcker heads the investigation and issued an interim report last week in New York. Pieth was interviewed by telephone in New York where he joined Volcker for the release of the report.

The United Nations' oil-for-food program was its largest humanitarian aid operation and ran from 1996 to 2003 when it ended. It was designed to allow the former Iraqi government to sell limited amounts of oil in exchange for humanitarian goods as an exemption from sanctions put in place in 1991 after Saddam invaded Kuwait.
(snip/...)

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/apeurope_story.asp?category=1103&slug=Oil%20For%20Food

[progressoid]

1. Hmm, wouldn't it be funny if Halliburton / Chenney were implicated?...nt

[zbdent]

2. I was thinking that many of the documents marked as "classified" and

seized by the US forces probably had Halliburton stationery and were personally signed by Dick Cheney.

Maybe a bunch of thank you notes from Ronald Reagan & 41 . . . plus the receipts from the chemical weapons . . .