U.N. Details Kickbacks Paid for Iraq's Oil
October 27, 2005
By WARREN HOGE
nytimes.com
More than 4,700 companies took part in the United Nations oil-for-food program and more than half of them paid illegal surcharges and kickbacks to Saddam Hussein, the independent committee investigating the program reported today.
The country with the most companies involved in the program was Russia, followed by France, according to the committee led by Paul A. Volcker, former chairman of the Federal Reserve Board....
...The $64 billion program was set up by the Security Council to help ease the effects of United Nations sanctions on the 27 million Iraqis by supplying food and medicines in exchange for letting the Hussein government export oil....
...Mr. Hussein received $1.8 billion in illicit income from surcharges and kickbacks on the sales of oil and humanitarian goods during 1996-2003, when the program ran, the committee concluded in its last report in September....
<$64 Billion program, $1.8 Billion siphoned off in kickbacks to Saddam. That's a little over 2.8%.>
Mr. Volcker noted that in the years immediately preceding the program, smuggling of Iraqi oil in much larger amounts had been going on for years to the benefit of the economies of American allies, including Jordan and Turkey. In his last report, Mr. Volcker said this smuggling amounted to $10.99 billion.
<Thus, pre-program smuggling, through the territories of American allies amounted to a much larger total: over 17% of the total dollar amount of the sanctioned Oil for Food program.>
He suggested that this had a compromising effect on the Security Council's willingness to step in and stop the practice. "Three years, four years already, letting the oil flow into Jordan and Turkey, so now you're going to be very strict about this smaller volume of oil?" he asked. "Unlikely.".... |
