Thursday, October 27, 2005
The UN in action...
... along with our friends France, Russia and Marc Rich.
More than 2,000 of the foreign companies that did business with Iraq in the U.N. oil-for-food program made illicit payments to Saddam Hussein's government, a report on the program said on Thursday...After nationalizing health care, the next thing: World Government!
The report said companies in 66 countries paid kickbacks on selling Iraq humanitarian goods and companies from 40 countries paid surcharges on oil contracts, but the U.N. Security Council took little action...
Preferential treatment was given to companies from France, Russia and China, all permanent members of the Security Council, who were more favourable to lifting the 1990 sanctions compared to the United States and Britain... [Reuters]
Former Iraqi President Saddam Hussein's regime received about $1.8 billion in illicit payments under the United Nations' oil-for-food program...
... the countries that "were responsible for approving their national companies to do business with the program took no action." By early fall of 2000, the Iraqi government had ordered surcharges be imposed on every barrel of oil sold under the program, the report said...
The report cited a number of contracts with Russian companies, which it said accounted for about 30 percent of oil sales. "By far, the largest portion of surcharge payments went through the Iraqi Embassy in Moscow between March 2001 and December 2002"...
The report said Marc Rich and Co. financed 4 million barrels of oil under a 9.5-million-barrel contract awarded to the European Oil and Trading Co. (EOTC), a French-based shell company "Surcharges were imposed on the oil," the report said, and "Marc Rich & Co. directed BNP Paris not to disclose its identity to BNP NY in connection with its financing of the U.N. contract."
It added, "According to an individual familiar with the companies, EOTC and Marc Rich & Co. agreed that the premium paid to EOTC would cover a commission and a surcharge. The premium paid by Marc Rich & Co. of 30-40 cents per barrel was sufficiently high to cover both."
Rich is an American expatriate and former fugitive who was pardoned in 2001 by then-President Bill Clinton...
[CNN]
