Food For Spoil
The United Nations' oil-for-food bargain with Saddam Hussein may well be the biggest scam of a "relief" effort in global history. It's a kraken of corruption that is hard to see whole because the investigations underway focus on one tentacle or another, while the monster 's bulk lies hidden in the murk of U.N. secrecy.
After the 1991 Gulf War, the U.N. slapped economic sanctions on Saddam's regime. Five years later, stung by heart-wrenching pictures of hollow-cheeked Iraqi children and statistics about infant mortality, the Security Council set up the Iraq Oil-for-Food Program. Iraq would be allowed to export oil and use the money to import food and humanitarian supplies.
Saddam shamelessly shook down the program to fuel his power machine. He undersold his oil, demanding part of the profit as a kickback. He made arrangements to overpay for the goods he bought, then took back part of the overpayment as more kickbacks. The U.S. General Accounting Office estimated that Saddam earned at least $10 billion from smuggling and kickbacks. He lined his pockets and pimped his sons' palaces while his people suffered.
The tyrant's perfidy should surprise no one. But what's disgusting is the number of willing partners he seems to have found in the U.N. and 50 nations around the world. Apparently, leading figures in France, Britain and Russia adamantly opposed the American bid to topple the dictator while taking his money under the table. Among the subpoenaed companies is a Swiss-based firm that employed U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan's son, Kojo, and which was in charge of monitoring goods entering Iraq.
Saddam's shenanigans would have run up red flags for anyone on the scout for evidence of graft. But you can't see with your eyes closed. And Kofi Annan's Secretariat, raking in a 2.2% commission on Saddam's oil sales, never systematically examined Saddam's contracts.
The scale of this scandal still has not percolated through the media, in part because it is being investigated piecemeal, by different agencies with different levels of secrecy, working independently at their own pace. For instance, three different congressional panels have subpoenaed the French bank BNP Paribas. This week, BNP delivered "a semitrailer truck load" of documents concerning the $60 billion it held in the oil-for-food escrow account.
At least two other committees in Congress are investigating allegations of U.N. corruption. The U.N.'s own investigation of the morass apparently is focused on bribery allegations. The interim Iraqi government in Baghdad, meanwhile, has reams of documents from the old regime waiting to be examined.
At stake is the legitimacy of the U.N. itself. Already shaken by the rifts opened in the run-up to the Iraq invasion, the U.N. now finds itself in a situation where only a little over a quarter of the citizens in its major contributor nation, the U.S., feel the organization reflects their values.
The U.N. should be subject to the same scrutiny given to Halliburton, or applied by the 9/11 Commission. It has failed miserably to protect lives in Bosnia, Rwanda and Somalia, it continues to dither while Darfur dies. Yet its leadership lives in denial.
And now, we are beginning to learn that, while Annan scolds the American administration for overthrowing a murderous tyrant, he has yet to acknowledge that he presided over that tyrant's theft of food from dying children.
After the 1991 Gulf War, the U.N. slapped economic sanctions on Saddam's regime. Five years later, stung by heart-wrenching pictures of hollow-cheeked Iraqi children and statistics about infant mortality, the Security Council set up the Iraq Oil-for-Food Program. Iraq would be allowed to export oil and use the money to import food and humanitarian supplies.
Saddam shamelessly shook down the program to fuel his power machine. He undersold his oil, demanding part of the profit as a kickback. He made arrangements to overpay for the goods he bought, then took back part of the overpayment as more kickbacks. The U.S. General Accounting Office estimated that Saddam earned at least $10 billion from smuggling and kickbacks. He lined his pockets and pimped his sons' palaces while his people suffered.
The tyrant's perfidy should surprise no one. But what's disgusting is the number of willing partners he seems to have found in the U.N. and 50 nations around the world. Apparently, leading figures in France, Britain and Russia adamantly opposed the American bid to topple the dictator while taking his money under the table. Among the subpoenaed companies is a Swiss-based firm that employed U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan's son, Kojo, and which was in charge of monitoring goods entering Iraq.
Saddam's shenanigans would have run up red flags for anyone on the scout for evidence of graft. But you can't see with your eyes closed. And Kofi Annan's Secretariat, raking in a 2.2% commission on Saddam's oil sales, never systematically examined Saddam's contracts.
The scale of this scandal still has not percolated through the media, in part because it is being investigated piecemeal, by different agencies with different levels of secrecy, working independently at their own pace. For instance, three different congressional panels have subpoenaed the French bank BNP Paribas. This week, BNP delivered "a semitrailer truck load" of documents concerning the $60 billion it held in the oil-for-food escrow account.
At least two other committees in Congress are investigating allegations of U.N. corruption. The U.N.'s own investigation of the morass apparently is focused on bribery allegations. The interim Iraqi government in Baghdad, meanwhile, has reams of documents from the old regime waiting to be examined.
At stake is the legitimacy of the U.N. itself. Already shaken by the rifts opened in the run-up to the Iraq invasion, the U.N. now finds itself in a situation where only a little over a quarter of the citizens in its major contributor nation, the U.S., feel the organization reflects their values.
The U.N. should be subject to the same scrutiny given to Halliburton, or applied by the 9/11 Commission. It has failed miserably to protect lives in Bosnia, Rwanda and Somalia, it continues to dither while Darfur dies. Yet its leadership lives in denial.
And now, we are beginning to learn that, while Annan scolds the American administration for overthrowing a murderous tyrant, he has yet to acknowledge that he presided over that tyrant's theft of food from dying children.
Labels: Iraq, Kofi Annan, oil-for-food, Saddam, united nations
