FRENCH FOR BRIBERY
NY Post Editorial
January 31, 2004 -- Longtime rumors that Saddam Hussein bribed key foreign dignitaries - including top French officials - have apparently been confirmed by documents found in Iraq.
The documents, first published last week by the al Mada newspaper in Baghdad, include a list of 270 individuals and organizations from 50 countries, all of whom apparently received vouchers for millions of barrels of oil.
The bribery seems to have been part of a campaign to influence international opinion on behalf of the Saddam regime.
On the list, part of which is available on www.memri.org, are politicians from around the Arab world; a host of Russian companies and institutions including Vladimir Putin's political party; the PLO; India's Congress party; the president of Indonesia - and George Galloway, the British politician who was among Saddam's most fervent supporters.
Also on the list is Iraqi-American businessman Shakir al-Khafaji, who funded the notorious anti-sanctions documentary film "In Shifting Sands" by former arms-inspector-turned-Saddam-apologist Scott Ritter.
Not at all surprisingly, French companies, politicians and officials fared well - thus confirming that greed and corruption also inspired Paris' attempts to save Saddam.
The U.N.'s notoriously corrupt and mismanaged "Oil for Food" program seems to have been the key to Saddam's system of bribery, though the vouchers given out by the regime were also exchanged for oil illegally smuggled through Syria and Turkey.
So far, nothing has been found to confirm reports that Saddam secretly gave money to French President Jacques Chirac's campaign funds.
But France's former interior minister, Charles Pasqua - a close friend and former colleague of Chirac - is on the list as having received $12 million in Iraqi crude. He denies the charge, but it was Pasqua who fought to allow visits by top Iraqi officials to France in 1993.
It's another reason why these bombshell documents must be authenticated as soon as possible (they are being investigated by the Iraqi Governing Council and the U.S. Treasury Department).
But already the real reason behind much of the international opposition to the war is becoming clearer.
And it comes as no surprise.
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