Billions in Iraq funds 'lost'

[dArKeR]

London - The US-run body governing Iraq has failed to account for billions of dollars allocated for rebuilding the country, a prominent British aid group charged on Thursday.

Christian Aid said in its report that the Coalition Provisional Authority had only explained publicly how it had spent $1bn of the $5bn it has been given for Iraqi development.

The funds include $1bn from the former United Nations Oil for Food program, $2.5bn in assets seized from Saddam Hussein's former regime an $1.5bn in oil revenues, the group said.

http://www.news24.com/News24/World/Iraq/0,,2-10-1460_1434614,00.html

I thought I saw this story on the DU but can't find it now so here goes.

[joanski01]

1. Geez, I'll bet

that Chalabli character knows where it is. He and his best buddy, Rumsfeld. And Paul Bremer, and Haliburton.

[emad]

2. From the BBC's coverage of this news item:

The charity's accusations come as a big international conference to raise money for the reconstruction of Iraq is getting under way in the Spanish capital, Madrid.

However, Christian Aid says the lack of information about what happened to the existing money is fuelling suspicion and mistrust among ordinary Iraqis.

One of the report's authors, Dominic Nutt, said it was possible that the money had been spent in a perfectly legitimate way, but the authority had not demonstrated this as it was obliged to do by the terms of its United Nations mandate.

<snip>
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/3206841.stm

Interesting author's name: maybe it's a pseudonym....

[teryang]

3. This is the same group

...that looted the our savings and loans in the eighties of hundreds of billions of dollars and got away with it.

The current American regime is little more than organized looting. If they have to go to war and kill tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands to do it, they will.

[emad]

6. That reminds me: looting 'savings and loan' -

isn't that Neil Bush's fave speciality?

[ozymandius]

8. His ponzi scheme was pulled at Silverado Savings and Loan.

Of course, we never heard the name Bush mentioned in the scandal.

[Dover]

9. Pirates....that's apparently what the "skull and bones" represents.

They loot and murder and live by their own code.

[davhill]

4. Remember all those gold bars?

We saw pictures of them all stacked up where us forces found them after they had been looted from the Iraq Central bank. One haul was $600 million and the other $300 million. <http://www.orlandosentinel.com/news/nationworld/orl-asecgold08060803jun08,0,6767619.story?coll=orl-news-headlines> It had been allocated toward the rebuilding of Iraq. Then there was a small item in the mainstream press indicating that they were not gold bars after all but just gold painted brass. No indication of why they had been painted, who had painted them and what really happened to the gold looted from the Central bank. Then nothing. There is something crooked going on, something big and crooked.

[cthrumatrix]

5. looks like another "investigation required"... in which we will never

hear a word....next to 911 panel, energy task force, blackout investigation...etc...

take a number

[xchrom]

7. god -- i am so jaded

not only am i not surprised{re: the poster who mentioned the 80's savings and loan scams} -- i'm not even sure i care. pity, that.

[leftchick]

10. This story is really not going to go over well with the Iraqis....

it is front and center at aljazeera's web site...

http://english.aljazeera.net/HomePage

With a disgusting photo of bremer....

[KoKo]

11. Nothing is ever investigated, no outrage, no accountablility, no press

harping every day like "Kobe, Kobe, Kobe!"

Nope. As long as Kobe and the Sports figure or Celebrity of the moment is all the Media want to push in our faces.....no one will hear about this. No one will express outrage.

There's no outrage left. It's all been used up. America is Jaded...There is no sense of right and wrong left. Just Kobe, Kobe, Kobe.

[TahitiNut]

12. duplicate

See http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=102&topic_id=179910

I'm locking this thread. Interested DUers are welcome to continue discussing this in the referenced thread.

Thank you for your understanding and cooperation,
TahitiNut - DU moderator