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Politics : I Will Continue to Continue, to Pretend.... -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

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To: Sully- who wrote (572) 12/19/2003 2:08:02 AM From: Sully-   Respond to of 35834   Poland Takes Pride in Assertive Stance Toward Neighbors By MARK LANDLER New York Times WARSAW, Dec. 18 — Poland is on the outs with much of Europe these days, but to judge from the defiance of its top officials, opposition leaders and ordinary Poles, that suits people here just fine. <font size=4> The country has been in a chest-thumping mood since last weekend, when Poland and Spain broke up a summit meeting on the new European constitution by refusing to yield to demands by France and Germany that they accept a new, less favorable voting system for the European Union. <font size=3> "Poland needs to stand up for itself," said Katarzyna Lukomska, 40, a midwife who was shopping for a winter hat this week. "We can only stand to gain from it in the long run." That is very much a matter of debate. Europe's paymasters, led by France and Germany, are petitioning to freeze the union's budget — a move seen by some as a form of payback to Poland, which expects to be a prime recipient of European aid after it joins the union in May. Yet even the threat of financial retaliation has not dented the enthusiasm of Poles for the hard line taken by their leaders. Prime Minister Leszek Miller, who arrived at the summit meeting in Brussels in a wheelchair, nursing injuries from a helicopter crash, has reversed a downturn in his political fortunes. While the dispute centered on the arcane question of how to apportion the voting rights of the different members of the union, it has laid bare deep-seated feelings of resentment and insecurity, as well as a new assertiveness, on the part of Poles. Despite a population of 39 million and by far the largest economy in Central Europe, many here fear that Poland will not be treated as a full partner in a greater Europe. "We keep seeing ourselves as a small country," Danuta Hübner, the minister for European affairs, said in an interview. "In fact, Poland is a big country. We are half of what is joining Europe in terms of population. We should have the responsibilities that come with being a big country." Such talk is heard more and more often these days. Five months before it adds 10 new countries with 75 million people, the European Union seems to be cleaving into two camps — one centered on France and Germany, the other encompassing an assortment of bantam and middleweight countries. <font size=4> This latest crisis erupted two weeks after Germany and France effectively vitiated the fiscal rules that govern the countries using the euro as their common currency, refusing to bring their budget deficits under a mandated ceiling. For Europe's smaller countries — as well as would-be members, who are dutifully bringing their finances into line with European standards — the impunity with which France and Germany acted suggests that the union keeps a different rulebook for its biggest members. In Poland's case, the frictions with Germany and France have been aggravated by Warsaw's staunch support of the American-led war on Iraq, which Berlin and Paris just as staunchly opposed. <font size=3> After the meeting in Brussels fell apart, Chancellor Gerhard Schröder of Germany bitterly criticized Poland and Spain, though not by name. Two countries, he said, had been "unable to change their way of thinking and acting." They had "left the European idea behind" in pursuit of their own interests. Ms. Hübner, who is expected to be appointed Poland's representative on the European Commission next year, shrugs off Mr. Schröder's remarks with a serene smile. Poland, she said, has little choice but to cling to the rules that were hammered out in hard-fought negotiations three years ago in Nice. Under that agreement, Poland and Spain were each awarded nearly the same number of votes as the more populous France, Germany, Britain and Italy. Germany and France are seeking to insert rules into the constitution that would shift power back to the bigger countries, by ensuring that decisions could be passed if a majority of countries representing at least 60 percent of the union's population voted in favor of them. "We based our prereferendum campaign on the Nice formula," Ms. Hübner said, referring to the ballot here last June in which 77 percent of voters favored joining the European Union. "It would be very difficult to have to tell people, `What you voted for is no longer the case.' " But the lopsided margin suggests that Poles would have voted for the union, whatever the voting arrangements. Few here dispute that joining Europe will bring more benefits than costs. Still, the Nice accord has become a touchstone. A prominent Polish opposition leader, Jan Rokita, summed up the feeling when he declared, "Nice or death" — a sound bite that instantly became a slogan. The issue, simply put, is one of respect. People here believe that Poland, by dint of its size, warrants special treatment. Beyond that they believe that Germany, historically one of Poland's oppressors, and France, historically Poland's champion, need to be curbed. "The Nice treaty keeps a balance between old, rich countries and new emerging countries," said Waclaw Rejdych, 43, a businessman doing Christmas shopping. "I don't want to be penalized because Germany has a much bigger economy than Poland." But most Poles, perhaps reflecting their bruised history, fully expect that they will be penalized. "There's no question that France and Germany will use money to punish Poland," said Elzbieta Jozwik, a university student. "That's what strong nations do to weaker ones." The immediate winner from the standoff was Prime Minister Miller, who leads Poland's Social Democrats. Mr. Miller had been plagued by scandals and swooning opinion poll numbers when a helicopter he was riding in crashed in a forest outside Warsaw on Dec. 4. The impact fractured two of his vertebrae. He soldiered through the summit meeting, against the advice of doctors, before returning home to the hospital. In a show of support as rare as it may be fleeting, Poland's political establishment lined up behind him. Mr. Miller told the newspaper Gazeta Wyborcza that the dispute might delay the adoption of a European constitution for at least the first half of next year. Not everybody here applauds Poland's intransigence. Marek Ostrowski, a leading foreign affairs commentator, said it was less a principled stand than a display of Poland's insecurities and pathologies. Rather than defer to Poland, Mr. Ostrowski predicted, Germany and France will find a way to bypass it. He also questioned why Poland was so intent on cultivating an "exotic alliance" with Spain instead of working to close the gap with its natural partner, Germany. "It serves no purpose at all," he said. "It is just an exercise in national pride to serve a domestic audience." nytimes.com

To: Sully- who wrote (572) 12/19/2003 2:32:05 AM From: Sully-   Respond to of 35834   The Postwar World Belmont Club History and history in the making The Postwar World The objective of the War on Terror is plainly to defeat the enemy. But this goal can be expressed in an alternative manner as the shaping of the postwar world. The surprising thing is that both formulations must be equivalent, being by definition exactly the same state. Yet unforeseeable consequences of conflict make it difficult to predict, until the last moment, what the possibilities of peace may be. When Roosevelt, Churchill and Stalin met for the final time in Yalta, they could allow the focus to shift from the prosecution of hostilities, for by then the Axis was manifestly doomed, to an explicit attempt to restructure a globe that had irrevocably changed. The Cold War boundaries between East and Western had their genesis in these talks. It was at Yalta that the United Nations was first conceived. It was there that the foundations of 50 years of future history were laid. Yet in a sense, none of the victors had arrived blindly at the spot. Each in his imperfect manner had groped towards that moment, guided by some vision of the future world. That was what they made war for. Although the fight against terrorism is far from over, it must inevitably reach its Yalta moment, the point at which the victors, however they may be defined, codify and make regular the changes that have taken place. The geopolitical map has already changed utterly. The United States is master of the Middle East and Central Asia, in addition to her overlordship of the Pacific and guarantorship of large swathes of Europe. The old powers of Central Europe have attempted to maintain themselves by expanding the European Union and forging alliances wherever they could, with mixed success. A Democratic Revolution has swept over the old post-colonial world, including many nations previously beholden to Bolshevism. Many of the artificial nations formed hastily with the withdrawal of European colonialism have started to become authentically viable. While the boundaries remain fuzzy, a general picture has started to take form. <font size=4> But of the fate of the United Nations, little has been said. In hindsight, the UN succeeded admirably at the task of doing nothing. The Security Council, the functional core of the UN, was designed to create a permanent state of deadlock. This kept the Great Powers from conflict by freezing everything in place. But the avoidance of world war was purchased at the price of accepting a permanent state of misery and regional conflict. In the succeeding years, nearly 60 wars would come to the attention of the Security Council for resolution. It would act in only two: Korea 1950 and Kuwait 1991, the first by accidental Soviet absence, the second, after the multipolar system had already collapsed by the accession of the United States to global dominance. Ultimately the price proved too high. Under the shadow of the Cold War, itself a consequence of the stasis designed into the peace of 1945, petty tyrants multiplied, millions were oppressed, and the most backward ideologies flourished. The aircraft that destroyed the two World Trade Center towers figuratively started their flight in Yalta, flown by men born literally not very far from where Roosevelt, Churchill and Stalin pored over their maps. It seems clear that any successor institution to the United Nations must be designed for meaningful action rather than intentional paralysis, within a framework of checks and balances. It must come to terms with the single most salient reality of the postwar world: the de facto supranational police power of the United States. The existence of this vast power is a temptation to create a world government, which is for the first time in history feasible, and for that reason utterly to be shunned. Instead of using it directly, which would be corrupting, international institutions should promote the spread of freedom and civil society, exploiting the historical opportunity of the existence of a power that provides a lower bound on the misbehavior and rapacity of rulers. This opportunity for freedom has come before on a smaller scale, at Runnymede and Philadelphia. Not upon the promise of government but on the absence of tyranny. The world does not need a new framework of treaties, least of all a world government, but the freedom to prosper as nations on a planet in which everything except oppression is permitted. For it is self-evident that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with unalienable Rights, that the only excuse for government is to secure these rights and that these words can be translated into every living tongue. <font size=3> belmontclub.blogspot.com

To: Sully- who wrote (572) 12/20/2003 4:36:51 AM From: Sully-   Respond to of 35834   Political satire By Diana West Published December 19, 2003 Washington Times <font size=4> Iraq's interim foreign minister, Hoshyar Zebari, had a thing or two to tell the U.N. Security Council: "One year ago the Security Council was divided between those who wanted to appease Saddam Hussein and those who wanted to hold him accountable," the Kurdish mountain-guerrilla-turned-diplomat said, his words chilling the diplomatic double-talk of the Security Council hothouse. The United Nations "failed to help rescue the Iraqi people from a murderous tyranny," he said, "and today we are unearthing thousands of victims in horrifying testament to that failure." There was more: "Settling scores with the United States should not be at the cost of helping to bring stability to the Iraqi people," Mr. Zebari warned. "The U.N. must not fail the Iraqi people again." Such frankness reveals that not only does the emperor have no clothes, but neither does the secretary-general, who appeared shocked by Mr. Zebari's indictment.<font size=3> "This is not the time to pin blame and point fingers when everybody is trying to figure out how creatively we can organize ourselves to help Iraqis," the politically exposed Kofi Annan said by way of response, streaking down the high road in a moral blur. Jean-Marc de la Sabliere, French ambassador to the United Nations, made no such defensive bones about it: "I don't want to comment on the past." It is a strange state of affairs when U.N. diplomats, displaying an imperious non-accountability that pretty much went out of style with the divine right of Bourbons, are to be congratulated, sort of, just for acknowledging the existence of facts that need accounting for. That is, in refusing to pin blame, point fingers or comment on the past, they have in fact admitted there is something in the past upon which to pin blame, point fingers and comment. Even this implicit admission, it turns out, is something. Or so it seems after absorbing some of the weirder, practically extraterrestrial exercises in denial of another, even more palpable fact -- the capture of Saddam Hussein. "Last night Saddam Hussein was in Fallujah," the New York Times reported an Iraqi man as saying, two days after the dictator was taken into U.S. military custody. "I didn't see him. But some people swore on the Koran at the mosques they saw him. What was on television was untrue." Another man pointed out that it would have taken "five years at least" to grow a beard like the one "Saddam Hussein" wore in the rat hole, proof enough, he said, that the deposed dictator remains a free man. <font size=4> Such reality-deprived reactions are not atypical. The captive "is someone wearing a Saddam mask," an Iraqi man explained to the Associated Press, adding: "It is a trick to help get President Bush elected." This last remark lifts (lowers) the blind-faith denial fantasy into genuine lunatic conspiracy theory. Similar theories abound in the Middle East -- the Americans and the Israelis committed the September 11 atrocities to elicit sympathy for themselves is a popular one -- where a government-run daily like Saudi Arabia's Al-Riyadh can editorialize that Saddam Hussein's capture was "a show" produced to "give new momentum to the American president just when he needs it." More disturbing still is the exploding popularity of such utterly crackpot theories here at home, in the heart of the Democratic Party. Maybe it started with Democratic presidential candidate Howard Dean, the Al-Gore-anointed, opinion-poll-tested front-runner, who has publicly floated the notion that President Bush had prior knowledge of September 11 and did nothing. This theory, cooked up out of the most toxic chaff of the Internet rumor mill, doesn't even qualify as half-baked. Which says as much about Dr. Dean as it does about the theory. The day after American forces seized Saddam Hussein, Rep. Jim McDermott, Washington Democrat, the congressman who declared in Baghdad last year that Mr. Bush would lie to get the United States into a war on Iraq, told an interviewer that Saddam Hussein's capture was a political stunt timed to help Mr. Bush politically. American forces could have captured him "a long time ago if they wanted," he said. Now, former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright has joined what you might call the Oliver Stone Democrats. Fox News Channel's Morton Kondracke reports that Madame Secretary told him President Bush may already know where Osama bin Laden is, but he is waiting for that perfect political moment to bust him. Question: Does this despicable theory reflect the depths to which Democrats believe Mr. Bush is capable of sinking -- Mr. Kondracke's belief -- or, rather, the depths to which Democrats would themselves sink in his place? Either answer is ugly enough to put on a Saddam mask and look good. <font size=3> washingtontimes.com.

To: Sully- who wrote (572) 12/23/2003 11:40:00 PM From: Sully-   Respond to of 35834   U.N.Welcome Hands-off Iraq. — John F. Cullinan, an expert in international law and human rights, formerly served as a senior foreign-policy adviser to the U.S. Catholic bishops. By far the most-cunning bid to manufacture a role for the U.N. in Iraq comes from Iraqi Shiite Muslim leaders seeking political cover for themselves. What they're seeking is a face-saving way to retreat from their long-standing insistence on direct elections as the sole legitimate basis for Iraq's transitional government, slated to assume full sovereignty on July 1, 2004. There's almost universal acknowledgement that nationwide elections before that date are a practical impossibility, given the lack of an agreed-upon census, an electoral law, or adequate electoral machinery — not to mention the ongoing insurgency and otherwise unsettled conditions. And there's growing awareness that, by mulishly insisting on the impossible, Iraq's Shiite leaders would bear full responsibility for any delay in the much-anticipated handover of sovereignty. But the awkwardness of facing facts — without also appearing to bow to American pressure — is further complicated by the religious edict or fatwa mandating elections that was issued last June by the Shiites' preeminent spiritual leader, Grand Ayatollah Ali Hussein Al-Sistani. Since the ayatollah cannot be seen to have changed his mind, much less to have conceded to the Americans, circumstances themselves must be shown to have changed — ideally by some neutral observer charged with pointing out what everyone already knows. "If it is truly impossible to hold direct elections, he wants to hear that from a neutral institution like the U.N.," said a spokesman for the Islamist political party SCIRI (Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq). Never mind that this is akin to summoning a man from New York to inform the ayatollah what time it is in Najaf. It offered a long-sought opening for U.N. involvement that Secretary-General Kofi Annan was characteristically quick to seize. Just three days after Ayatollah Sistani's request — warp speed in the diplomatic world — Annan advised the Security Council: "While there may not be time to organize free, fair and credible elections, every segment of Iraqi society should feel represented in the nascent institutions of their country." Whether this bland pronouncement affords enough political cover for Iraqi clerics and politicians remains to be seen. But if the cost of this little diversion is a substantive role for the U.N. in Iraq's political transition, that's too high a price to pay. <font size=4> At the same December 16 Security Council meeting, Iraq's interim foreign minister, Hoshyar Zebari, rightly rebuked the Council for its lamentable record of appeasing Saddam's gangster regime: One year ago the Security Council was divided between those who wanted to appease Saddam Hussein and those who wanted to hold him accountable. The UN as an organization failed to help rescue the Iraqi tyranny from a murderous tyranny that lasted over 35 years, and today we are unearthing thousands of victims in horrifying testament to that failure. Zebari followed up this plain statement of fact by correctly pointing out that Iraq's U.S.-appointed Governing Council (IGC) also happens to be "the most representative and democratic governing body in the region." "As Iraqis," he added, "we strongly disagree with those of you that question the legitimacy of the present Iraqi authorities." <font size=3> These are strong words indeed, especially coming from an interim government addressing the Security Council as an observer rather than a member state. (Zebari's supplicant status was underscored by his placement at the end of the Council's horseshoe-shaped table, rather like a child invited to dine with the grownups.) Little wonder that the blunt-spoken Kurd's remarks did not sit well with Kofi Annan and his diplomatic ally, France. <font size=4>"Now is not the time to pin blame and point fingers," Annan told reporters afterwards. Indeed, words seemed to have failed this master of the diplomatic rabbit punch. "Quite honestly," he reiterated, "now is not the time to hurl accusations and counteraccusations." "I don't want to comment on the past," echoed the French ambassador. What seems remarkable is that Zebari nonetheless appealed for — you guessed it — U.N. help: "Settling scores with the U.S.-led coalition should not be at the cost of helping to bring stability to the Iraqi people." "Squabbling over political differences," he added, "takes a back seat to the daily struggle for security, jobs, basic freedoms, and all the rights the UN is chartered to uphold." What's wrong with this picture? Given its sorry record of appeasement and determined opposition to Iraq's liberation, what exactly does the U.N. now have to offer "in the daily struggle for security, jobs, basic freedoms"? Consider just who stands to gain from U.N. meddling in Iraq's delicate political transition. Hint: It's not the U.S., and it's not the Iraqi people. First, Security Council members like France, Russia, and Germany would gain undue and undeserved influence over postwar Iraq at U.S. expense. So too would neighboring regimes, all of which share a common interest in thwarting the emergence of Iraqi democracy. Second, it is very much in the institutional self-interest of the U.N. bureaucracy to grab a piece of the action in the biggest game in town. But more is at stake than jobs for the boys for an institution in search of a role in the post-Cold-War world. For Annan sees the U.N. as an independent player in the world of nation-states, not simply as a dispensary of humanitarian aid and technical advice. That's why he's holding out for "complete oversight of the political transition, not lesser tasks such as election monitoring," according to a senior U.N. official quoted on condition of anonymity in the December 17 Los Angeles Times. What's really at issue is the size and scope of the U.N.'s role, not the risks of operating in Iraq. An unnamed Security Council diplomatic helpfully translated Annan's repeated requests for "clarification" as demands for a coequal role with the CPA: "He's essentially saying, given the risks, you've got to make it worth our while." Left unsaid is that if this ploy reduces U.S. influence in postwar Iraq — as it necessarily does — so much the better. Third, certain Iraqi factions would like nothing better than having another set of foreigners to play off against the Americans. That's why two IGC members who normally don't see eye-to-eye — Sunni secularist Adnan Pachachi and Shiite Islamist Abdel Aziz al-Hakim — both welcomed Annan's surprise invitation to a three-way meeting with the CPA on January 15. As Don Corleone would say, this is nothing personal; it's business. But Iraqi political figures would do well to weigh the short-term tactical advantages of an alliance with the U.N. against the costs of parasitic U.N. bureaucracy and perpetual tutelage over local politics in Bosnia, Kosovo, and East Timor. <font size=3> Bear in mind that the CPA and the IGC already face steep hurdles in working out the November 15 "Agreement on Political Process" in the run-up to the July 1 transfer of sovereignty. These include resolving the much-vexed elections issue by mid-January; finalizing the all-important interim constitution (by February 28); and concluding status-of-forces agreement with all coalition partners fielding troops in Iraq (by March 31). <font size=4>Does anyone seriously believe that adding the U.N. to these bilateral negotiations would help rather than hinder progress? And does anyone believe that U.S. interests would have been better served if the U.N. had been present as an independent actor with its own agenda during the talks leading up to the November 15 agreement itself? In properly bilateral negotiations, three's a crowd. That's especially true where the third party defines itself largely in opposition to U.S. interests and values. An earlier piece discussing strategies for dealing with Iraq's various factions advised against treating friends and enemies exactly the same. Any doubt where the U.N. belongs? <font size=3> nationalreview.com

To: Sully- who wrote (572) 12/26/2003 7:34:58 PM From: Sully-   Respond to of 35834   <font size=4>Has France shot itself in the foot?<font size=3> Amir Taheri December 24, 2003 <font size=4> Has France shot itself in the foot by trying to prevent the toppling of Saddam Hussein? <font size=3> The question is keeping French foreign policy circles buzzing as the year draws to the close. Even a month ago, few would have dared pose the question. <font size=4> In denial mode, the French elite did not wish to consider the possibility that President Jacques Chirac may have made a mistake by leading the bloc that opposed the liberation of Iraq last March. Now, however, the search is on for someone to blame for what the daily newspaper Liberation describes as “the disarray of French foreign policy.” There are several reasons for this. The French have seen Saddam Hussein’s capture on television and found him not worthy of the efforts that their government deployed to prolong his rule. They have also seen the Iranian mullahs agreeing to curtail their nuclear programme under the threat of US military action. And just this week they saw Muammar al-Kaddhafi, possibly the most egocentric windbag among despots, crawl into a humiliating surrender to the “ Anglo-Saxons”. The fact that France was not even informed of the Kaddhafi deal is seen in Paris as particularly painful. <font size=3> The episode provoked some cacophony at the top of the French state. <font size=4> On Monday, the Defence Minister , Mrs. Michelle Alliot-Marie, claimed that Paris had been informed of the deal with Libya. Moments later, Dominique de Villepin, the Foreign Minister, denied any knowledge. Chirac was forced to intervene through his Elysee spokeswoman who tried to pretend that the French knew what was afoot but not directly from the US and Britain. <font size=3> Some French commentators believe that the Bush administration is determined to isolate France and “teach her a lesson” as punishment for the French campaign in favour of Saddam. “ Vengeance is a hamburger that is eaten cold,” writes Georges Dupuy in Liberation. “The fingerprint of the United States could be detected in the setbacks suffered by France’s diplomacy.” A similar analysis is made by some academics and politicians. “France over did it,” says Dominique Moisi, a foreign policy researcher close to the Chirac administration. “Our opposition to the war was principled. But the way we expressed it was excessive. The Americans might have accepted such behaviour from Russia, but not from France which was regarded as an ally and friend.” Moisi describes as “needlessly provocative” the campaign that Villepin conducted last spring to persuade Security Council members to vote against the US-backed draft resolution on Iraq, He says that the Chirac administration did not understand the impact of the 9/11 tragedy on America’s view of the world. Pierre Lellouche, a member of parliament, claims that the US has “a deliberate strategy to isolate France, echoing what happened during the Iraqi crisis.” There is no doubt that France has suffered a number of diplomatic setbacks in the past year or so. But not all were linked to the Iraq issue or, as many French believe, the result of score-settling by Washington. <font size=4> Soon after winning his second term as president last year, Chirac quarrelled with British Prime Minister Tony Blair over a range of European issues. The two were not on speaking term for almost six months. Chirac then had a row with Italy’s Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi after a French minister described the Italian leader as a “dangerous populist”. In the course of the past year Chirac has also quarrelled with Spain’s Prime Minister Jose-Maria Aznar, both about Iraq and on a range of European issues. Last spring Chirac invited the leaders of central and eastern European nations to “shut up” after they published an op-ed in support of US policy on Iraq. In September France decided to ignore the European Stability Pact, the cornerstone of the euro, to accommodate the biggest budget deficit of any European Union member. And last month, Chirac together with German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder, provoked a diplomatic fight with Poland and Spain, thus preventing the adoption of the much-advertised European Union Constitution. France’s policy in the Middle East and Africa is also in a mess. France’s passionate campaign to keep Saddam in power won no plaudits from the Arabs. Many Arab leaders regard France as a maverick power that could get them involved in an unnecessary, and ultimately self-defeating, conflict with the United States. “I cannot imagine what Chirac was thinking,” says a senior Saudi official on condition of anonymity. “How could he expect us to join him in preventing the Americans from solving our biggest problem which was the presence of Saddam Hussein in power in Baghdad?” Another senior Arab diplomat, from Egypt, echoes the sentiment. “The French did not understand that the Arabs desired the end of Saddam, although they had to pretend that this was not the case,” he says. In Africa, the recent Libyan accord with Britain and the US deals a severe blow to French prestige. Libya is the most active member of the African Union and its exclusion of France, also from talks on compensation for victims of Libyan terrorism, sets an example for other African nations. To be fair, France is trying to repair some of the damage it has done to itself, and its allies, by trying to prolong Saddam’s rule. This month, Chirac unrolled the red carpet for a delegation from the Iraqi Governing Council which had been described by Villepin as “an American tool” a few weeks earlier. France has also agreed to write-off part of the Iraqi debt and to side with the US and Britain in convening the Paris Club of creditor nations to give new Iraq a helping hand. And, yet, it is unlikely that France can restore its credibility without a reform of the way its foreign policy is made. <font size=3> Villepin may end up as the scapegoat . Liberation complains about what it sees as Villepin’s decision to “practice the art of eating humble pie” by praising the Anglo-American success in Libya. “What happened to Villepin’s flamboyance?” the paper demands. “How far have we come from the famous French Arab and African policies!” But to blame all on Villepin, a rather excitable amateur poet, is unfair. <font size=4>In France, foreign policy is the exclusive domain of the president, with the foreign minister acting as his secretary. <font size=3> The system was created by General De Gaulle, a larger than life figure, in 1958, and a time that France, involved in the Algerian war and under attack from the Soviet bloc and its French Communist allies in the context of the Cold War, needed a single foreign policy voice. Since then the world has changed and France with it. It is not normal that France should be the only major democracy in which the prime minister and his Cabinet and the parliament, not to mention he political parties and the media, have virtually no say in shaping foreign policy. The cliché about foreign policy being “ the domain of the president” is an insult to democracy. Had France had the debates over Iraq that other democracies, notably the United States and Britain, organised at all levels, especially in their respective legislatures, it is more than possible that Chirac would not have been able to impose a pro-Saddam strategy that was clearly doomed to failure. France might have ended up opposing the war, all the same, as did Germany. But it would not have become involved in an active campaign against its allies and in favour of an Arab despot. France must certainly review its foreign policy. But what it needs even more urgently is a reform of its institutions to end the monarchic aspects of the Fifth Republic. townhall.com

To: Sully- who wrote (572) 1/2/2004 11:23:31 AM From: Sully-   Respond to of 35834   I wonder how many Westerners will be on the list? From: LindyBill _________________________________________________________ - the minister of foreign affairs stated that SH confessed during the on going investigations that he used to offer large sums of money to some Arabic media officials and political personalities in the past years to encourage them to assist him on his propaganda program and to give a good impression to the Arab world about his regime. The Iraqi minister said that these names will be declared later in the Iraqi journals with the amounts of money paid by SH to those people. (I think that Al-Jazeera should be waiting for the good news now!!). iraqthemodel.blogspot.com. Message 19645886

To: Sully- who wrote (572) 1/10/2004 5:14:58 PM From: Sully-   Respond to of 35834   U.S. Says It Has Proof of Sales to Iraq Officials give no details but say evidence supports claims that Russian companies sold military equipment used in the war. By Paul Richter and Kim Murphy Los Angeles Times Staff Writers January 10, 2004 <font size=4> [as Glenn Reynolds says, this, of course, is why the Bush Administration's efforts to keep the UN relevant were a bad idea. The Security Council was -- and is -- packed with people who were on the other side.] WASHINGTON — U.S. officials have found evidence corroborating the Bush administration's allegations that Russian companies sold Saddam Hussein high-tech military equipment that threatened U.S. forces during the invasion of Iraq last March, a senior State Department official said Friday. The United States has found proof that Russian firms exported night-vision goggles and radar-jamming equipment to Iraq, the official said. The evidence includes the equipment itself and proof that it was used during the war, said the official. <font size=5> Such exports would violate the terms of United Nations sanctions against Baghdad. <font size=4> "We have corroborated some of that evidence," the official told a group of reporters. While insisting that the matter was "now in the past," he said that the Bush administration "never received entirely satisfactory explanations" to its charges, and acknowledged that the issue "is still a sensitive one in the relationship." "It's an issue that, shall we say, did not do much for strengthening trust," he said. The issue burst into public view March 24, just days after the war began, when President Bush called Russian President Vladimir V. Putin to voice his concern about the use of goggles, jamming equipment and advanced antitank missiles. The White House said at the time that it had "credible evidence" that the equipment came from Russian companies. The goggles and jammers were of special concern to the U.S. because American forces, seeking to wage war over great distances with low casualties, relied on night-vision devices and high-tech missile and aircraft guidance systems. The goggles use heat sensors to enable infantrymen to continue operations even in the pitch of night; the jammers block signals from satellites that guide cruise missiles and "smart" bombs. <font size=5> Putin staunchly denied the charges. But the allegation added friction to a relationship already strained at the time because of Russia's vocal opposition to the U.S.-led invasion. <font size=4> Yevgeny V. Khorishko, press secretary for the Russian Embassy in Washington, said Friday that although the allegations were first raised before the war, "we have never received real proof from the American side that Russian firms were involved in the delivery of this equipment." The State Department official declined to elaborate on what the proof was. <font size=3> Khorishko noted that the U.S. and Russia were now involved in broad talks to halt the spread of weapons around the world. He said he could not comment, under the terms of those talks, on whether they addressed U.S. concerns about the night-vision and jamming equipment. In raising the issue last year, U.S. officials contended that although the hardware was allegedly sold by private companies, the Russian government could have taken steps to oversee and block the traffic. They maintained at the time that the gear had been sold relatively recently, and with an understanding that it could be used in such a war. High-tech military equipment is a top export for Russia. Though the country's military budget has shrunk dramatically, its military industry exports about $5 billion annually in tanks, planes, small arms and other equipment — directly or through transshipment — to dozens of countries. <font size=4> During the war, U.S. military sources gave differing accounts of how much the Russian-made equipment affected American-led coalition forces. Some military officials were quoted as blaming jamming gear for sending missiles off course and into Iran and Saudi Arabia, and claiming that Russian-made Kornet antitank missiles destroyed at least two American M1A1 tanks during the war, the first time such tanks had been destroyed in battle. But other officials said the equipment had little effect during the rapid sweep to Baghdad. <font size=3> Some Russian arms industry executives and military analysts said the charges about the jamming equipment were made only to explain the inaccuracy of U.S. smart bombs. Some argued, too, that the allegations were pointless, since the hardware could have been legitimately sold to other countries and then exported to Iraq without Russian authorities' knowledge. A U.S. intelligence official said he could provide no further details on the alleged shipments and acknowledged that it was generally very difficult to determine whether a government is aware of, let alone involved in, shipments by companies operating within its borders. "It's always unclear as to what extent governments know about what companies are doing on their turf," the official said. Though top U.S. officials have not publicly named the companies believed to be involved, the firms are widely reported to have included Aviakonversiya, which manufactures radar-jamming equipment, and KBP Tula, the manufacturer of Kornet antitank guided missiles. Leonid B. Roshal, deputy director of KBP Tula, said in an interview late last year that his company sold about 1,000 Kornets to Syria three or four years ago, but insisted that the transaction was "absolutely legitimate." "As of today, there is no evidence that Kornet antitank missiles have ever been discovered in Iraq," he said. Aviakonversiya is a small, private development company founded in Moscow in 1991 by Oleg Antonov, who used to work for the Soviet military complex before founding the company. It has recently specialized in the production of small, portable jammers. They are not considered military equipment by Russia, since they are not built according to Russian military standards and are made with commercially available parts. The jammers are said to have a range of 90 to 125 miles. Because they emit a radio frequency, six sites where they allegedly were used were found and destroyed by U.S. aircraft, according to the military. Antonov, in an interview last year, denied that Aviakonversiya sold any jammers to Iraq, and insisted that the company had no specialists in Iraq to train soldiers in their use. He said the company makes some components of the jammers in Russia, buys other components elsewhere and assembles the units abroad because of Russia's "crazy customs regulations." He said Iraqi delegations visited the company about 15 times, talking about buying the devices, but never came up with the money. "They promised to pay the money, then they would send two or three questions via e-mail, and after that they disappeared," he said. "A few months after that, another Iraqi delegation would arrive. And all that lasted for four years. I couldn't stay away from those meetings, even though I knew that I was simply wasting my time." In the end, he said, he became convinced that the Iraqis were trying to use him as a scapegoat: They would buy the equipment elsewhere, but make it look as though they bought it from him. "So if something is discovered, they could easily leave me vulnerable," Antonov said.* ----------------------------- Richter reported from Washington and Murphy from Moscow. Times staff writer Greg Miller in Washington contributed to this report.

To: Sully- who wrote (572) 1/28/2004 4:48:19 PM From: Sully-   Respond to of 35834   Ö¿Ö Saddam compensated his "friends" in barrels of oil Le journal irakien "Al-Mada" a publié une liste des personnes bénéficiaires des largesses du raïs. Onze Français sont cités, dont Charles Pasqua. Un responsable du ministère du pétrole affirme que des "poursuites en justice" seront engagées pour récupérer "l'argent du peuple irakien". <font size=4> The Iraqi journal "Al- Mada" published a list of beneficiaries of the regime. Eleven French citizens are cited, among them Charles Pasqua. An official of the ministery of petroleum affirmed that some judicial investigations will be engaged in to recoup money for the people of Iraq. <font size=3> Bagdad de notre envoyé spécial Baghdad, from our special envoy Saddam Hussein récompensait ses amis étrangers, notamment tous ceux qui étaient les zélateurs de son régime et s'en faisaient les ambassadeurs. Cela était connu. Plus de dix mois après la chute de la dictature irakienne, des éléments de preuve ont été publiés pour la première fois, dimanche 25 janvier, par un journal indépendant Al-Mada (L'Horizon). <font size=4> Saddam Hussein compensated his foreign friends, notably those who were partisans of his regime and acted as its ambassadors. They were well-known. More than ten months after the fall of the Iraqi dictator, some elements of proof have been published for the first time, Sunday the 25th of January, by an independent newspaper "Al-Mada" (The Horizon). <font size=3> Sur une pleine page, ce nouveau quotidien étale dans son 45e numéro, la liste de plus de 270 personnalités connues ou inconnues, de sociétés, de parlementaires, d'associations, des journalistes, des partis politiques qui ont profité des largesses du raïs déchu. <font size=4> On a full page, the new daily lays out in its 45th number the list of more than 270 personalities known or unknown, the societies, the parlementarians, the associations, the journalists, the political parties which profited from the largess of the fallen regime. <font size=3> Facsimilé à l'appui, ce journal dénonce "la plus grande opération de corruption" de l'ancien régime. Et il affirme que "des millions de barils de pétrole ont été offerts à des individus qui n'ont rien à voir avec les activités pétrolières". Au total, 16 pays arabes, 17 européens, 9 asiatiques et 4 d'Afrique et d'Amérique du Sud et du Nord sont concernés par cette opération de récompense. <font size=4> With a facsimile to support it, the journal denounces "the great operation of corruption" of the former regime. And it affirms that "millions of barrels of oil were offered to individuals who overlooked the oil activities of the regime." In total, 16 Arab countries, 17 European, 9 Asian, and 4 African and South and North America were involved in this operation of compensation. <font size=3> Abdel Saheb Salmane Qotob, sous-secrétaire au ministère du pétrole, nous a confirmé ces informations précisant que parmi les personnalités impliquées figurent deux premiers ministres, deux ministres des affaires étrangères ainsi que des fils de ministres et de chefs d'Etat. <font size=4> Abdel Saheb Salmane Qotob, under- secretary of the ministery petroleum, confirmed to us this information precisely that among the persons implicated figured two prime ministers, two ministers of foreign affairs, as well as the sons of ministers and chiefs of State. <font size=3> "Le ministère va dévoiler tous les noms et les poursuivre en justice pour récupérer l'argent du peuple irakien", a-t-il indiqué, ajoutant que "les informations nécessaires étaient recueillies pour les soumettre à Interpol et les poursuivre car Saddam Hussein a acheté les consciences et dilapidé la richesse pétrolière de l'Irak". <font size=4> The ministery was going to unveil all the names and pursue them judicially in order to recoup the money of the Iraq people:, he indicated, adding that "the necessary information was gathered to submit to Interpol and to pursue them because Saddam Hussein bought their consciences and despoiled the oil riches of Iraq." <font size=3> Pour la France, pas moins de onze noms sont publiés avec la quantité de barils de pétrole qui leur a été allouée. <font size=4> For France, no less than eleven names are published with the quantity of barrels of oil that they were allocated. <font size=3> Parmi eux, écrits avec une orthographe parfois approximative et comprenant quelques incertitudes sur les prénoms ou intitulés de sociétés et associations, figurent la société Adax, Patrick Maugein de Traficor ou Travicor, Michel Grimard, l'association d'amitié arabo-française, Charles Pasqua, Elias El-Ferzeli ou Ghazarli d'origine libanaise, Claude Kaspereit, Bernard Mérimée (ancien ambassadeur de France à Rome et à l'ONU), Bernard Desmaret et De Souza. <font size=4> Among them, written with an orthography sometimes approximate and containing some uncertainties on the surnames or titles of the societies and associations, figure the society Adax, Patrick Maugein of Traficor or Travicor, Michel Grimard (the Association of Arab- french Friendship), Charles Pasqua, Elias El- Ferzeli or Gharzarli (of Lebanese origin), Claude Kaspereit, Bernard Merimee (former ambassador of France to Rome and the UN), Bernard Desmaret and De Souza. <font size=3> 12 millions de barils auraient notamment été alloués à Charles Pasqua, quatre autres M. Kaspereit et trois à M. Mérimée tandis que Patrick Maugein aurait bénéficié de 25 millions de barils. Aucune autre précision n'est donnée. Les documents proviennent de la SOMO (State Oil Marketing Organisation), société de commercialisation du pétrole rattachée au ministère du pétrole.Twelve million barrels have, notably, been allocated to Charles Pasqua, four others to Mr. Kaspereit, and three to Mr. Merimee as well as Patrick Maugein, who benefited from 25 million barrels. Nothing more precise is given. The documents were provided by the State Oil Marketing Organization, the commercial society of oil attached to the ministery of petroleum. UNE LETTRE DE LA SOMO A letter to the SOMO Georges Gallaway, ancien député travailliste aux Communes, figure en bonne place dans la liste. Son nom est mentionné dans six contrats et le journal publie une lettre de la SOMO en date du 31 décembre 1999, signée par Saddam Zbin, cousin de Saddam Hussein qui gérait cette société et dans laquelle il demande au ministère du pétrole de lui accorder des contrats. Apparemment, ce parlementaire britannique a été particulièrement bien traité. Mais il n'est pas le seul. <font size=4> George Gallaway, former Labour deputy in the House of Commons, figures highly on the list. His name is mentioned in six contracts and the journal published a letter of the SOMO dated the 31 of December, 1999, signed by Saddam Zbin, cousin of Saddam Hussein who managed oil contracts for him. Apparently, the British parlementarian was well treated. But he is not alone. <font size=3> Dans cette très longue liste figure aussi Khaled, le fils du président égyptien Nasser, le fils du ministre syrien de la défense, le fils du président du Liban, Emile Lahoud, la fille du président indonésien Sukarno, Megawati, aujourd'hui premier ministre, l'église orthodoxe russe et le Parti communiste russe. <font size=4> In this very long list figures also Khaled, the son of the Egyptian president Nasser, the son of the Syrian minister of defense, the son of the president of Lebanon (Emile Lahoud), the daughter of Indonesian president Sukarno (Megawati), the current prime minister, the orthodox church of Russia, and the Russian Commmunist Party. <font size=3> L'ultranationaliste russe Vladimir Jirinovski, lui aussi, est particulièrement bien loti (79,2 millions de barils). Des sociétés suisses, des ressortissants italiens, des députés jordaniens, des hommes politiques égyptiens, le Front populaire de libération de la Palestine (FPLP), l'organisation de libération de la Palestine (OLP) sont cités. La liste n'est pas exhaustive. <font size=4> Ultranationalist Russian Vladimir Jirinovski, he also, is particularly well-off (79.2 million barrels). Some Swiss societies, some Italian nationalists, some Jordanian deputies, some Egyptian politicians, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, the PLO are cited. The list is not exhaustive. <font size=3> Parmi les pays cités figurent entre autres : l'Afrique du Sud, l'Algérie, l'Arabie saoudite, l'Australie, Bahreïn, la Biélorussie, le Brésil, la Bulgarie, le Canada, la Chine, Chypre, l'Espagne, la Libye, la Malaisie, le Maroc, le Nigeria, Oman, le Panama, les Philippines, le Qatar, la Roumanie, la Turquie, l'Ukraine, le Yémen et la Yougoslavie. <font size=4> Among the countries cited figure: South Africa, Algeria, Saudi Arabia, Australia, Bahrein, Belarus, Brazil, Bulgaria, Canada, China, Cyprus, Spain, Libya, Malaysia, Morocco, Nigeria, Oman, Panama, the Phillippines, Qatar, Romania, Turkey, Ukraine, Yemen, and Yugoslavia....... <font size=3> lemonde.fr@2-3218,36-350628,0.html Ö¿Ö

To: Sully- who wrote (572) 1/28/2004 8:07:53 PM From: Sully-   Respond to of 35834   Focus of N-probes shifts from Pakistan to Europe HAGUE: The focus of international investigation on nuclear technology transfer to Iran and Libya has shifted this week from Pakistan to several European countries, including the Netherlands that harbours designers and developers of uranium enrichment centrifuges used in the nuclear programmes of Pakistan, Iran, Libya and North Korea, a source in Hague told The News. After Pakistani authorities indicated that debriefing of top Pakistani nuclear scientists is reaching its culmination, IAEA and European investigators undertook investigations into nuclear proliferation. <font size=4>The probe would identify the role played by European scientists and nuclear managers associated with some top companies in Europe in illegal transfer of nuclear technology to Iran, Libya and North Korea, the source said. <font size=3> The core question that European investigators are probing is whether designs for uranium enrichment centrifuges, developed by the Dutch unit of Urenco, which Tehran allegedly acquired from a middleman in 1980s, came from inside Pakistan or Urenco provided it to Tehran, or their source were the companies that supply components to Urenco, the source said. Dutch Foreign Minister Bernard Bot and Economic Affairs Minister Laurens-Jan Brinkhorst in their written replies last week, to questions from a Dutch member of Parliament (MP), have already admitted that there were "indications" North Korea and Libya might have acquired potentially arms-related nuclear technology developed in Europe that Pakistan and Iran are known to possess, the source said. The Dutch ministers confirmed that the authorities in the Netherlands were investigating the source of supply, to Iran, of designs for uranium enrichment centrifuges developed by the Dutch unit of Urenco, which is suspected to have been done by a middleman. The ministers also confirmed that the same technology, developed by the British-Dutch-German Urenco consortium, may have found its way into Libya and North Korea. In their reply to the MP, the two Dutch ministers said "the source supplying the Urenco technology to Libya and Iran was not clear", adding, "the matter was being probed". Urenco is the same Dutch/German/British uranium enrichment facility in the Netherlands where the father of Pakistani nuclear bomb, Dr Qadeer Khan, had been working in 1970s. Despite his repeated denial of all charges related to alleged involvement in nuclear espionage, a court in Amsterdam sentenced him in absentia to four years in jail in 1983. Pledging the Netherlands cooperation in the investigation the Dutch ministers in their reply to the MP said, "The Netherlands has offered full cooperation to the IAEA in investigating the technology’s origins." The Dutch ministers said, "The IAEA investigations into the origins of Iran’s enrichment technology led to a clear conclusion" adding, "it would concern Urenco technology from the 1970s." <font size=4> Buoyed by the information ascertained through a professional but preliminary scrutiny of the nuclear programmes of Iran and Libya, IAEA inspectors and experts have concluded that scientists, nuclear manager and companies from the Netherlands, Switzerland, Austria, Germany, the UK, France and other western European countries need to be investigated thoroughly to ascertain the truth on the basis of the evidence in possession of the IAEA, the source said. <font size=3> Dutch and German intelligence agencies, according to another source, are engaged in investigating what they describe as the "crucial leads" related to some officials of the Dutch-British-German consortium, the Urenco. Urenco has been named as one of the companies that had allegedly been playing a role in Iran’s centrifuge programme, but the company’s spokesman has vehemently denied the allegation of supplying nuclear components to Iran or Libya. European investigators do not rule out that the European countries that supply components to Urenco might have sold the same pieces of technology to Iran. Based on the conclusion drawn by experts associated with the international watchdog, the probe in Europe has been widened. <font size=4> Authorities in Switzerland, Austria, Germany, the UK, France and the Netherlands have also been asked to investigate the companies across Europe that had been supplying the components to Urenco, the source said. <font size=3> European investigators are concentrating on identifying the source which allegedly supplied the first drawing of centrifuge technology to Iran in late 1980. The investigators expect to unravel covert activities of more than two decades through investigations launched to identify cartels of the "middle men" who had been helping in illegal transfer of nuclear technology to Iran and Libya. Some intelligence outfits in Europe believe that the investigation to identify the source or sources that had been supplying nuclear technology to Iran could not be completed without launching a thorough probe into the companies which had been providing Pakistan the most sophisticated nuclear components to build its nuclear programme, the source said. "The nuclear investigation in Europe will be a multi-pronged exercise. Its main targets will be those ‘middle men’ who had been helping in nuclear programme of any country in the world," the source said. <font size=4> Meanwhile, European investigators are also examining a brochure which had been allegedly handed out by some Pakistani scientists at trade shows in France, Germany and other countries. The brochure with a picture of Dr AQ Khan on its cover page, according to the interpretation of European investigators, implied that "Pakistani scientists were willing to sell sensitive centrifuge know-how to whosoever wanted to purchase that," the source said. <font size=3> hipakistan.com

To: Sully- who wrote (572) 1/28/2004 8:21:49 PM From: Sully-   Respond to of 35834   Translation to English of a French article exposing Saddam's paid cronies..... CORRUPTION: COUPONS OF SADDAM HUSSEIN (continuation) Complete translation of the document published by Iraqi newspaper "Al Mada" and revealed on line by the Elaph.com site By Al Mada - Iraq At the request of our readers who were very numerous to read the extract that we published on January 26 on the recipients of the deposed Iraqi mode, we publish here the totality of these revelations. <font size=4>Country by country, name by name, the table of a planetary corruption "Al Mada" reveals, documents with the support, where and how the Iraqi oil incomes, under Saddam Hussein, evaporated. Politicians, journalists and parties obtained million barrels of Saddam.<font size=3> "Al Mada" got part of the documents of the national Company of Marketing of Iraqi Oil which comprise the list of names of the people and companies having profited, within the framework of the agreement "oil against food", of considerable quantities of the oil crude Iraqi on personal order of Saddam Hussein. The coupons, thus signed by the deposed president, concern the third phase of arrangement, since the two first limited, in accordance with the resolutions of UNO, the customers of Iraq to the oil operators who have refineries, whereas the third phase of the application of arrangement authorized the supply of oil to any operator. <font size=4> Under this technical name, appear names of people, companies, organizations, men and parties political which have nothing to do with the oil sector, of which in particular the Russian orthodoxe Church. One could include/understand the case of the journalist Syrian woman Hamida Naanaa, who defended the deposed mode to make live his newspaper "independent" thanks to generosity of the Iraqi dictator, but whereas comes to make the name of the son of former Egyptian president Gamal Abdel Nasser in this list? What to say of the Jordanian member of Parliament Toujane Al Fayçal, the president indonésienne, or of the son of the Syrian Minister for the Defense or the kid of the Lebanese president? Since the deposed mode accepted arrangement "oil against food", it quickly transformed it into a commercial tool and a political play which enabled him to finance its purchases of weapons and building materials intended to build its luxurious palates.<font size=3> It thus transformed the sale contracts of oil into the worst operation of purchase of the consciences and the feathers, by wasting the national richness. <font size=4>Since, the practice to allot coupons was spread in order to mobilize the recipients for the defense of the mode, to break the embargo and to raise the sanctions.<font size=3> The embargo finally did not aim at the mode, but the people. A posteriori, one includes/understands better why, each time the sanctions were going to be reduced, the mode made in kind do them perdurer. The deposed mode always needed the others to feel powerful. It thus transformed the goodwills of the defenders of the Iraqi people against the embargo into political tools of an extraordinary lowness. This mode ended up exclusively gathering around him the beggars. The baassists praised its merits by receiving the many delegations, but they could not that the visitors came, not to defend them, but to touch their rewards. <font size=4> The case of the Labour deputy British George Galloway is edifying. As soon as it approached the deposed mode, it was contaminated by corruption. It was expelled of the party, after criticisms which it had addressed to Tony Blair and to George Bush. We do not think that it can contradict, since the Iraqi official documents condemn it. These documents indicate by name Galloway with six recoveries like the final recipient of the coupons signed by Saddam. Galloway hid thus behind companies windows of nonBritish foreign nationality. <font size=3> With the consultation of these documents, it arises certain names of which we are unaware of if it acts people or companies, like "Samir". And it should be explained to discover the technique with which the mode, and Saddam Hussein, distributed these coupons, without compromising their friends. Thus, Samir is a very widespread first name, but it could also be a question of a company, (SAMIR, Moroccan oil company, note). This very elaborate technique arises with the reading of: <font size=4> Contract the 29/12/1999 on behalf of Finnish company OY-Fortum Oil and Gas with mention: for the account of George Galloway: 3 million barrels (intermediary: Burhan Jalabi). Contract the 10/7/2001 for the account of "Aredio Petrolium of Jordanian Fawwaz Zreikate with mention: George Galloway: 4 million barrels. Contract the 6/8/2001 for the account of Middle East Semi-conductor Inc Of Jordanian Fawwaz Zreikate with mention: Galloway recipient, 3 million barrels. Contract for the same Jordanian company, of the 3/5/2001: final recipient: George Galloway, 2 million barrels. Contract of the 12/12/2002, for the same preceding recipients, 3 million barrels. Similar contract the 3/6/2002, 3 million barrels. Thus, George Galloway profited from six contracts, under different names. All these documents are signed and dated by the minister from Oil from Saddam Hussein. But why personal mention of Galloway in these contracts? To undoubtedly recall to the minister the final recipient of the contract, and to obtain its downstream without discussing it. And it is probably the case of all the other recipients, whom it acts politicians, ONG, parties political or companies. <font size=3> Opposite the name of the payees the date of attribution is specified but, to save time, we reproduce simply the names, including the skinned names, and the quantity of oil which is intended to them: Syria 1 Awad Amoura (more than 18 million barrels? 18mb) 2 Bachar Nouri (more than 12 mb) 3 Ghassan Challah (11 mb) 4 Mohammed Ammar Naoufal (3,5 mb) 5 Tamam Chehab (1 mb) 6 Hamida Naanaa (more than 9 mb) 7 Firas Mustapha Tlass (6 mb) 8 Salim Al-Toun (3,5 mb) 9 Lotfi Fawzi (2,5 mb) 10 Lid for the achievements (3,5 mb) 11 Ghassan Zaccaria (6 mb) 12 Mohammed Maamoun Sabii (4 mb) 13 Hassan Kayyal (2 mb) 14 Anwar Al Aqad (2 mb) Oman 1 Groups Chanfari (5 mb) Cyprus 1 Mohammed Al Houni (more than 17 mb) 2 Naphtha Petrolium (13,2 mb) 3 Continental (3 mb) <font size=4> Turkey<font size=3> 1 Zeinelabidine Ardam (more than 27 mb) 2 Lotfi Dougane (more than 11 mb) 3 Mohammed Aslan (13 mb) 4 Takfun (15,5 mb) 5 KCK undertaken (1,5 mb) 6 Delta Petrolium (4 mb) 7 SITA (2 mb) 8 OZIA (2 mb) 9 SAMIR (2 mb) 10 Muhtashem (2 mb) 11 Mukdar Sajzine (2 mb) Vietnam 1 Finapco (1,2 mb) 2 Darlink Med (3 mb) 3 Fina Food (6 mb) 4 OSC (2 tons) Sudan 1 Smaso (8 mb) 2 Entrprise of production of oil (2 tons) 3 Oil More (2 tons) Yemen 1 Abdelkarim Al-Aryani (7,8 mb) 2 Toufik Abdelrahim (1,5 mb) 3 Chaher Abdelhak (more than 7 mb) Bengladesh 1 Moulana Abdelmannan (43,2 mb) India 1 Biham Think (5,5 mb) 2 It left the Congress (4 mb) Pakistan 1 Oil & Gas Group (10 tons) 2 Abou Abdelrahmane (11,5 tons) 3 Mr Azzaz (1 ton) Malaysia 1 Fayek Ahmed Sherif (12,5 mb) 2 BITMAL (4 mb) 3 Trad Beer (4 mb) 4 Mastek (Fayek Ahmed Sherif) (57 mb) 5 Hawala (7 mb) Indonesia 1 the girl of the president Sohartu (2 mb) 2 Hawa Atlantic (2 mb) 3 Makram Hakim (3 mb) 4 Mégawati (8 mb) 5 Mohammed Amine Rayes (4 mb) 6 Natona Oil (2 mb) <font size=4> United Arab Emirates <font size=3> 1 Valley Petrolium (1,8 mb) 2 Ahmed Maneh Saïd Al Outaïba (11 mb) 3 Jiwan Oil (4 mb) 4 Sultan Bin Zayed Al Nahyan (7,5 mb) 5 Al Hoda (22,9 mb) 6 Issa Bin Zayed Al Nahyan (5 mb) 7 Millinium (2 tons) 8 Bonny Fuel (1 ton) Morocco 1 Abdallah Salaoui (7,2 mb) 2 Nadel Hachémi (5,7 mb) 3 Mohammed Basri (4,5 mb) Algeria 1 Abdelmagid Attar (6 mb) 2 Abdelkader Bin Foamed (6 mb) Tunisia 1 Makades Petrolium (6,7 mb) 2 Vernaco (3,7 mb) 3 Maidor (4 mb) <font size=4> Italy <font size=3> 1 Roberto Formigoni (24,5) 2 Selvatori Nikotra (20 mb) 3 Mr Felloni (6,5 mb) 4 Father Benjamin (4,5 mb) 5 West Petrol (2 tons) 6 Hetrelk (2 tons) 7 ABS (1 ton) 8 Italian oil Association (1 ton) <font size=4> Spain <font size=3> 1 Bassem Kakich (17,5 mb) 2 Javier Robert (9,8 mb) 3 Ali Balloute (8,8 mb) Yugoslavia 1 socialist Party (22 mb) 2 Party of left (9,5 mb) 3 Italian Party (16 mb) 4 Party of Kostunitsa (6 mb) Bielorussia 1 liberal Party (6 mb) 2 Communist Party biélorusse (7 tons) 3 Company Bielminal (14,2 mb) 4 Company Bielpharm (4 mb) 5 Director of the cabinet of the presidency (6 mb) 6 Company Lada (2 mb) Romania 1 Ylef Adrelnec (1 mb) 2 Party of Rumanian Work (5,5 mb) <font size=4> The United Kingdom <font size=3> 1 George Galloway/Fawwaz Zreikate (19 mb) 2 Moudjahidin of the people (36,5 mb) <font size=4> Canada <font size=3> 1 Arthur Mel Holland (9,6 mb) <font size=4> The United States <font size=3> 1 Chaker Khafaji (7 mb) 2 Samir Vest. (10,5 mb) Chad 1 Foreign Minister (3 mb) Thailand 1 Exporter of rice Gaïborn (9,5 mb) Panama 1 Mr Sifane (11,5 mb) Hungary 1 Party of the Hungarian Interest (4,7 mb) South Africa 1 Envium Manangment (Sandi Majali) (9 mb) 2 Tokyo Sixweel (4 mb) 3 Montica (4 mb) 4 Omni Adil (4 mb) The Philippines 1 Consortium of the producers Filipinos (3 mb) Netherlands 1 Say Polt (3 mb) <font size=4> France <font size=3> 1 Adax (3/8 mb) 2 Traficora (Patrick Mougin) (25 mb) 3 Michel Grimard (1/17 mb) 4 Association of friendship free-Arabic (15,1 mb) 5 X (47,2 mb) 6 Charles Pasqua (12 mb) 7 Elias Ferzli (14,6 mb) 8 A Lotus (Claude Caspar) (4 mb) 9 Bernard Miramé (3 mb) 10 Bernard Miramé (8 mb) 11 Di Suza (11 mb) <font size=4> China <font size=3> 1 Mr Juan (39,1 mb) 2 Noresco (17,5 mb) 3 Zyng Rong (13 mb) 4 Byourg (13,5 mb) 5 Thouth Holken (1 mb) <font size=4> Jordan <font size=3> 1 Leïth Chbaïlate (15,5 mb) 2 Fakhri Kaouar (6 mb) 3 Large Resources (2 mb) 4 International Al-Rachid (Ahmed Al Bachir) (9 mb) 5 Fawwaz Zreikate (6 mb) 6 Salem Naass (6 mb) 7 Ziyad Ragheb (7 mb) 8 Machhour Hadissa (4 mb) 9 Chaker Bin Zaïd (6,5 mb) 10 Mohammed Saleh Hourani (4 mb) 11 Toujane Al Fayçal (3 mb) 12 Ministry for Energy (5 mb) 13 Ziyad Yaghmour (2 mb) 14 Wamid Hussein (1 mb) <font size=4> Palestine <font size=3> 1 Abou Abbas (11,5 mb) 2 Abdallah Hourani (8 mb) 3 Wafa Toufik Sayegh (3,5 mb) 4 PLO (4 mb) 5 FPLP (5 mb) 6 political Department of the PLO (5 mb) <font size=4> Egypt <font size=3> 1 Incom (Mohammed Chattate) (14 mb) 2 Abdelazim Manaf (6 mb) 3 Khaled Gamal Abdel Nacer (16,5 mb) 4 Imad Jelda (14 mb) 5 Mohammed Salah (7 mb) 6 Mohammed Helmi (4,5 mb) 7 plain Arab Companies (6 mb) 8 Company the Nile-Euphrate (3 mb) 9 Mahmoud Majdi Maasraoui (7 mb) 10 Company Alhami Bachandi (2 mb) 11 Company Moultaka Al Daouli (2 mb) <font size=4> Lebanon <font size=3> 1 LP Energy (2 mb) 2 Fadi Almieh (2 mb) 3 Haïtham Sidani (2 mb) 4 Planet Petrolium (1 mb) 5 George Tarkhanian (7 mb) 6 sons of the president Lahoud (4,5 mb) 7 Ali Tohmé (1 mb) 8 Company Al Hilal (Adnan Janabi) (1 mb) 9 international Company for the trade and the investment (3 mb) 10 Fayçal Dernaïka (3 mb) 11 FIM Oil (1 mb) 12 Najah Wakim (3 mb) 13 Oussama Maarouf (3 mb) 14 Zouhair Al Khatib (3,5 mb) Bahreïn 1- Entreprise Kazem Darrazi (2 mb) 2- Ent. Ali Al Mouslem (3 mb) 3- Ent. Concret pour constructions (2 mb) Arabie Saoudite 1 - Entreprise Naja (3 mb) 2 - ASSIS entreprise (2 mb) Qatar 1- Hamas Ali Al Thani (14 mb) 2- Dalimi Group (4 mb) 3- Gulf Petrolium (2 mb) 4- Petrolina Oil (2 mb) 5- Entreprise d'entretien des puits pétroliers (2 mb) Libye 1- Choukri Ghanem (1 mb) Brésil 1- Fouad Sarhane (10 mb) 2- Mouvement du 8 octobre (Chaviez) (4,5 mb) Irlande 1- Riad Taher (11 mb) 2- Afro Eastern (2 mb) <font size=4> Nigeria <font size=3> 1- Haisson (7,2 mb) 2- Entreprise ZAZ (7,5 mb) 3- Entreprise IEG (ambassadeur du Nigeria) (1 mb) 4- Campaq (4 mb) Kenya 1- Mohammed Othman Saïd (10,5 mb) Bulgarie 1- Parti socialiste bulgare (12 mb) 2- Arak Pol (2 mb) Autriche 1- Hunz Kolger (3 mb) 2- Association arabo-autrichienne (1 mb) <font size=4> Suisse <font size=3> 1- Media (2 mb) 2- Delta Service (2 mb) 3- Iblom (1 mb) 4- Sepool (2 mb) 5- Klinko (12 mb) 6- Lakia (2 mb) 7- Alkon (23 mb) 8- Toros (8 mb) 9- Petrogas (5 mb) 10- Finar (21 mb) 11- Napkes (3 mb) Slovaquie 1- Parti communiste slovaque (4 mb) <font size=4> Ukraine <font size=3> 1- Parti démocrate social (8,5 mb) 2- Parti communiste ukrainien (6 mb) 3- Energy Ressources (2 mb) 4- Naphto Gas (8 mb) 5- Vasmach Imbex (2 mb) 6- Hu (Sokolov) (5 mb) 7- Orchatski (4,5 mb) 8- Fider Alti Torkomvki (1 mb) 9- Trans Esco (1 mb) 10- Maison Ukrainienne (10 mb) 11- FTD (2 mb) 12- Parti socialiste ukrainien (2 mb) <font size=4> Russie <font size=3> Les documents concernant la Russie font ressortir des dons de l'ordre de 1,336 milliard de barils. Cette précision concerne seulement les dons à l'Etat de Russie. Quant aux particuliers, organisations et partis : la liste s'établie comme suit : 1- Ent. Zarabachkand (176,5 mb) 2- Russ Napht Embex (Azakof du cabiet présidentiel) (86,9 mb, dont 1 mb qui revient à l'ambassadeur russe à Bagdad). 3- Les entreprise du Parti communiste russe (137 mb) 4- Amercom (ministère des situations d'urgences) (57 mb) 5- Entreprise M-chino-import (83,5 mb) 6- Alpha Eco (ministère des Affaires étrangères) (128,8 mb) 7- Petromin (Ministère des Affaires étrangères) (30,1 mb) 8- Slav Naphte (Gotisrev – 25,5 mb) 9- Zan Gas (49,1 mb) 10- Russ Napht (35,5 mb) 11- Kazine Invest (8,5 mb) 12- Kalm Napht-Gas (7,5 mb) 13- Gasprom (26 mb) 14- Tat Napht (Tatarestan) (64,5 mb) 15- Bach Napht (12 mb) 16- Louk Oil (64 mb) 17- Sergot Napht(-Gas (4 mb) 18- Siberia Napht-Gas (1 mb) 19- Naphta Moscou (25,1 mb) 20- Onaco (22,2 mb) 21- Sidanco (21,2 mb) 22- Sibnapht (8,1 mb) 23- Trans Napht (9 mb) 24- Yokos (2 mb) 25- Entreprises du parti libéral démocrate (Jirinovski) (79,8 mb) 26- Entreprises du parti de la paix et de l'unité (34 mb) 27- Comité russe de solidarité avec l'Irak (6,5 mb) 28- Association russe de solidarité avec l'Irak (12,5 mb) 29- Russ Napht-Gas export (12,5 mb) 30- Oral Invest (8,5 mb) 31- Académie moscovite des sciences (3,5 mb) 32- Raoumine (fils de l'ancien ambassadeur à Bagdad – 19,7 mb) 33- Université Gopken (3,5 mb) 34- Group Northwest (2 mb) 35- Gas Prom (Monsieur Hassan – 3 mb dont 1 million livré) 36- Nicolas Rijkov (13 mb) 37- Story Napht & Gas (6 mb) 38- Akht Napht (4,5 mpb) 39- Administration tchétchène (2 mb) 40- Adel Hilaoui (A.N.M aviation) (5 mb) 41- Khrouzelt (5 mb) 42- Trans Naphta (3 mb) 43- Directeur du cabinet présidentiel (5 mb) 44- Eglise orthodoxe de Russie (5 mb) 45- Parti nationaliste russe (2 mb) Traduit de l'arabe par Chawki Freiha Copyright proche-orient.info pour la traduction française. Reproduction en français interdite sauf accord formel de proche-orient.info

To: Sully- who wrote (572) 1/28/2004 8:33:12 PM From: Sully-   Respond to of 35834   Iraqi govt. papers: Saddam bribed Chirac >>BAGHDAD, Iraq, Jan. 28 (UPI) -- <font size=4>Documents from Saddam Hussein's oil ministry reveal he used oil to bribe top French officials into opposing the imminent U.S.-led invasion of Iraq. <font size=3> The oil ministry papers, described by the independent Baghdad newspaper al-Mada, are apparently authentic and will become the basis of an official investigation by the new Iraqi Governing Council, the Independent reported Wednesday. "I think the list is true," Naseer Chaderji, a governing council member, said. "I will demand an investigation. These people must be prosecuted." <font size=4> Such evidence would undermine the French position before the war when President Jacques Chirac sought to couch his opposition to the invasion on a moral high ground. <font size=3> A senior Bush administration official said Washington was aware of the reports but refused further comment<< washingtontimes.com

To: Sully- who wrote (572) 1/30/2004 3:52:10 PM From: Sully-   Respond to of 35834   Illegal arms pipeline to Iraq taraskuzio.net Saddam's Arsenal Arms From France, Russia, Germany, Belgium and China Message 18729921 Interpol urged to probe Chirac Message 18779773 French/German missiles mfd in 2002 found at Baghdad airport Message 18836568 Russia spied on Blair for Saddam telegraph.co.uk. BUSH ALLEGES RUSSIAN SALE OF BANNED EQUIPMENT TO IRAQ iraqcrisisbulletin.com. What's really "UP" with France & Iraq anyway? This is what is up with them. e-thepeople.org US Has Evidence Russia Sold Sensitive Military Equipment to Iraq truthnews.com

To: Sully- who wrote (572) 2/1/2004 2:33:57 AM From: Sully-   Respond to of 35834   FRENCH FOR BRIBERY NY Post Editorial January 31, 2004 -- <font size=4> Longtime rumors that Saddam Hussein bribed key foreign dignitaries - including top French officials - have apparently been confirmed by documents found in Iraq. <font size=3> 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. <font size=4> The bribery seems to have been part of a campaign to influence international opinion on behalf of the Saddam regime. <font size=3> 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. <font size=4> 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. <font size=3> 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. <font size=4> 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. <font size=3> NEW YORK POST

To: Sully- who wrote (572) 2/15/2004 11:17:49 PM From: Sully-   Respond to of 35834   Libyan Arms Designs Traced Back to China Pakistanis Resold Chinese-Provided Plans By Joby Warrick and Peter Slevin Washington Post Staff Writers Sunday, February 15, 2004; Page A01 Investigators have discovered that the nuclear weapons designs obtained by Libya through a Pakistani smuggling network originated in China, exposing yet another link in a chain of proliferation that stretched across the Middle East and Asia, according to government officials and arms experts. The bomb designs and other papers turned over by Libya have yielded dramatic evidence of China's long-suspected role in transferring nuclear know-how to Pakistan in the early 1980s, they said. The Chinese designs were later resold to Libya by a Pakistani-led trading network that is now the focus of an expanding international probe, added the officials and experts, who are based in the United States and Europe. The packet of documents, some of which included text in Chinese, contained detailed, step-by-step instructions for assembling an implosion-type nuclear bomb that could fit atop a large ballistic missile. They also included technical instructions for manufacturing components for the device, the officials and experts said. "It was just what you'd have on the factory floor. It tells you what torque to use on the bolts and what glue to use on the parts," one weapons expert who had reviewed the blueprints said in an interview. He described the designs as "very, very old" but "very well engineered." U.S. intelligence officials concluded years ago that China provided early assistance to Pakistan in building its first nuclear weapon -- assistance that appeared to have ended in the 1980s. Still, weapons experts familiar with the blueprints expressed surprise at what they described as a wholesale transfer of sensitive nuclear technology to another country. Notes included in the package of documents suggest that China continued to mentor Pakistani scientists on the finer points of bomb-building over a period of several years, the officials said. China's actions "were irresponsible and short-sighted, and raise questions about what else China provided to Pakistan's nuclear program," said David Albright, a nuclear physicist and former U.N. weapons inspector in Iraq. "These documents also raise questions about whether Iran, North Korea and perhaps others received these documents from Pakistanis or their agents." The package of documents was turned over to U.S. officials in November following Libyan leader Moammar Gaddafi's decision to renounce weapons of mass destruction and open his country's weapons laboratories to international inspection. The blueprints, which were flown to Washington last month, have been analyzed by experts from the United States, Britain and the Vienna-based International Atomic Energy Agency, the U.N. nuclear watchdog. Weapons experts in Libya also found large amounts of equipment used in making enriched uranium, the essential ingredient in nuclear weapons. That discovery helped expose a rogue nuclear trading network that officials say funneled technology and parts to Libya as well as Iran and North Korea. A central figure in the network, Pakistani metallurgist Abdul Qadeer Khan, acknowledged in a televised confession last month that he had passed nuclear secrets to others. Pakistan's president, Gen. Pervez Musharraf, then pardoned Khan. Of the many proliferation activities linked to Khan's network, the selling of weapon designs is viewed as the most serious. The documents found in Libya contained most of the information needed to assemble a bomb, assuming the builder could acquire the plutonium or highly enriched uranium needed for a nuclear explosion, according to U.S. and European weapons experts familiar with the blueprints. At the same time, one of the chief difficulties for countries trying to build nuclear weapons has been obtaining the plutonium or uranium. Libya appeared to have made minimal progress toward building a weapon, and had no missile in its arsenal capable of carrying the 1,000-pound nuclear device depicted in the drawings, the officials said. However, weapons experts noted, the blueprints would have been far more valuable to the other known customers of Khan's network. "This design would be highly useful to countries such as Iran and North Korea," said Albright, whose Washington-based Institute for Science and International Security has studied the nonconventional weapons programs of both states. The design "appears deliverable by North Korea's Nodong missile, Iran's Shahab-3 missile and ballistic missiles Iraq was pursuing just prior to the 1991 Persian Gulf War," he said. Such a relatively simple design also might be coveted by terrorist groups who seek nuclear weapons but lack the technical sophistication or infrastructure to build a modern weapon, said one Europe-based weapons expert familiar with the blueprints. While such a bomb would be difficult to deliver by air, "you could drive it away in a pickup truck," the expert said. The device depicted in the blueprints appears similar to a weapon known to have been tested by China in the 1960s, officials familiar with the documents said. Although of an older design, the bomb is an implosion device that is smaller and more sophisticated than the bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki at the end of World War II. Implosion bombs use precision-timed conventional explosives to squeeze a sphere of fissile material and trigger a nuclear chain reaction. Pakistan's first nuclear test in 1998 involved a more modern design than the one sold to Libya. Albright said the Libyan documents "do not appear to contain any information about the nuclear weapons Pakistan has built." The documents at the center of the investigation were handed over to IAEA inspectors in two white plastic shopping bags from a Pakistani clothing shop. The shop's name -- Good Looks Tailor -- and Islamabad address were printed on the bags in red letters. One of the bags contained drawings and blueprints of different sizes; the other contained a stack of instructions on how to build not only a bomb but also its essential components. The documents themselves seemed a hodgepodge -- some in good condition, others smudged and dirty; some professionally printed, others handwritten. Many of the papers were "copies of copies of copies," said one person familiar with them. The primary documents were entirely in English, while a few ancillary papers contained Chinese text. The package also included open-literature articles on nuclear weapons from U.S. weapons laboratories, officials familiar with the documents said. Strikingly, although most of the essential design elements were included, a few key parts were missing, the officials and experts said. Some investigators have speculated that the missing papers could have been lost, or hadn't yet been provided -- possibly they were being withheld pending additional payments. Others suggested that the drawings were simply thrown in as a bonus with the purchase of uranium-enrichment equipment -- "the cherry on the sundae," one knowledgeable official said. Libyan scientists interviewed by international inspectors about the designs said they had not seriously studied them and were unaware that anything was missing. As Libya had no suitable missile or delivery system for a nuclear weapon, the scientists might have decided to delay work on bomb designs until other parts of their weapons program were further advanced, one knowledgeable U.S. official said. U.S. and European investigators said there were many similarities among the other nuclear-related designs and components found in Libya and Iran, suggesting they were provided by the same network. As for who delivered the material to the Libyans, a European official who has studied the question said the connection to the Khan network was indirect. "The middleman is quite invisible. The middleman has covered his tracks very well." The evidence of China's transfer of nuclear plans to Pakistan confirms something that U.S. officials have believed since at least the early 1980s. A declassified State Department report on Pakistan's nuclear program written in 1983 concluded that China had "provided assistance" to Pakistan's bomb-making program. "We now believe cooperation has taken place in the area of fissile material production and possibly nuclear device design," the report said. While the discovery of direct evidence of such cooperation was disturbing, it was noteworthy that China's views on proliferation have changed dramatically since the 1980s, and its leaders now generally cooperate with the United States and other countries in stopping the leaking of sensitive weapons technology, said Jonathan Wolfsthal, a nonproliferation expert at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. "Did the Chinese make a huge mistake in sharing technology with Pakistan? Sure. Did we make a mistake by looking the other way in the 1980s when Pakistan was developing the bomb? Yes," Wolfsthal said. "But none of that should get in the way of dealing with the real threats we face today. Our priority must be to drain the swamp created by the action of these nuclear suppliers and businessmen over the past 10 years." Researcher Lucy Shackelford contributed to this report. washingtonpost.com. ------------------------------------------------------------

To: Sully- who wrote (572) 2/18/2004 12:32:20 AM From: Sully-   Respond to of 35834   Iraq oil cash funded MPs' campaigns Businessmen handed on money illicitly siphoned from UN deals to pressure groups run by George Galloway and Tam Dalyell David Leigh and David Pallister Tuesday February 17, 2004 The Guardian <font size=4> Money illicitly siphoned from the UN oil-for-food programme by Saddam Hussein was used to finance anti-sanctions campaigns run by British politicians, according to documents that have surfaced in Baghdad. Undercover cash from oil deals went to three businessmen who in turn supported pressure groups involving the ex-Labour MP George Galloway, Labour MP Tam Dalyell, and the former Irish premier Albert Reynolds, it is alleged in documents compiled by the oil ministry, which is now under the control of the US occupation regime. Separately, a dossier from the oil ministry in Baghdad has been handed by the British Foreign Office to Customs and Excise, which has been asked to investigate. They were also referred to the Cabinet Office because of their political sensitivity. <font size=3> "The government has been given copies of certain documents [from Iraq]," a Foreign Office spokeswoman said yesterday. "They are being passed to the appropriate authorities for consideration." Two of the three businessmen involved in UK campaigns, Burhan al-Chalabi and Riad al-Tajir, were based in Surrey; the other, Fawwaz Zureikat, a Jordanian entrepreneur, had offices in London. <font size=4> Mr Chalabi and Mr Zureikat gave money to the Mariam Appeal, run by Mr Galloway, the MP confirmed. Mr Tahir said he ran another anti-sanctions campaign called Friendship Across Borders, which had Mr Dalyell as its official patron and organised visits to Baghdad by supportive politicians. The three businessmen are alleged to have received money from Saddam via oil allocations. They sold the oil rights on at a profit of more than $1m (about £530,000), in an exploitation by Saddam of loopholes in the UN's then oil-for-food programme. Mr Tahir agrees he profited from the oil deals. Mr Chalabi refuses to comment. Mr Zureikat confirmed to Agence France Presse in Jordan last week that he had made the oil deals. <font size=3> The oil-for-food programme was set up in 1995 amid fears of a humanitarian disaster after the first Gulf war. Under the scheme, Saddam was allowed to sell limited quantities of oil to pay for food and medicine for the Iraqi people. <font size=4> The contents of the new documents shed light on Mr Galloway's libel battle with the Daily Telegraph. Last year newspaper reports based on purported Iraqi intelligence files led to him being accused of receiving an annual £375,000 in secret personal payments from Saddam. Our investigations in Iraq, New York, Paris, Moscow and London indicate the new British-related documents are authentic, although their meaning is not always clear. <font size=3> These files do not implicate Mr Galloway in personal corruption. Nor do they suggest that Mr Dalyell and Mr Reynolds, who always paid their own way, had any knowledge of what was going on. Mr Galloway said he was unaware that his financial sponsors were getting oil cash from the UN programme. But he accepts that he knew his supporters had links with Saddam's regime, and regarded that as an inevitable price to pay. Despite their importance in the bitter Galloway controversy, the contract documents seem unlikely to surface in the pending libel trial. <font size=4> The so-called oil list has already caused worldwide embarrassment, with allegations made against prominent people and companies in France, Russia, Switzerland and South Africa, as well as employees at the UN. Across the world, some of those named agree the lists seem authentic. Others deny it, or say details are exaggerated

To: Sully- who wrote (572) 3/5/2004 5:01:34 PM From: Sully-   Respond to of 35834   Russian Engineers Reportedly Gave Missile Aid to Iraq By JAMES RISEN Published: March 5, 2004 <font size=4> ASHINGTON, March 4 — A group of Russian engineers secretly aided Saddam Hussein's long-range ballistic missile program, providing technical assistance for prohibited Iraqi weapons projects even in the years just before the war that ousted him from power, American government officials say. <font size=3> Iraqis who were involved in the missile work told American investigators that the technicians had not been working for the Russian government, but for a private company. But any such work on Iraq's banned missiles would have violated United Nations sanctions, even as the Security Council sought to enforce them. Although Iraq ultimately failed to develop and produce long-range ballistic missiles and though even its permitted short-range missile projects were fraught with problems, its missile program is now seen as the main prohibited weapons effort that Iraq continued right up until the war was imminent. After the first Persian Gulf war in 1991, Iraq was allowed only to keep crude missiles that could travel up to 150 kilometers, or about 90 miles, but the Russian engineers were aiding Baghdad's secret efforts illegally to develop longer-range missiles, according to the American officials. <font size=4> Since the invasion last March, American investigators have discovered that the Russian engineers had worked on the Iraqi program both in Moscow and in Baghdad, and that some of them were in the Iraqi capital as recently as 2001, according to people familiar with the intelligence on the matter. Because some of the Russian experts were said to have formerly worked for one of Russia's aerospace design centers, which remains closely associated with the state, their work for Iraq has raised questions in Washington about whether Russian government officials knew of their involvement in forbidden missile programs. "Did the Russians really not know what they were doing?" asked one person familiar with the United States intelligence reports. <font size=3> A spokesman for the Russian Embassy in Washington denied any knowledge of the allegations of recent Russian technical support for Iraq's missile effort. "The U.S. has not presented any evidence of Russian involvement," said Yevgeny Khorishko, a spokesman for the Russian Embassy. Russia and the former Soviet Union were among Iraq's main suppliers of arms for decades before Iraq invaded Kuwait in 1990, leading to the first gulf war. The Bush administration has previously said it had uncovered evidence that Iraq had unsuccessfully sought help from North Korea for its missile program, but had not disclosed the evidence that Iraq had also received Russian technical support. <font size=4> C.I.A. and White House officials refused to comment on the matter, and people familiar with the intelligence say they believe that the administration has been reluctant to reveal what it knows about Moscow's involvement in order to avoid harming relations with President Vladimir V. Putin.<font size=3> "They are hyper-cautious about confronting Putin on this," complained one intelligence source. In his public testimony last week about the worldwide threats facing the United States, George J. Tenet, the director of central intelligence, restated Washington's longstanding concerns about Russia's controls over its missile and weapons technology, without mentioning the evidence of missile support for the Hussein government. "We remain alert to the vulnerability of Russian W.M.D. materials and technology to theft or diversion," Mr. Tenet said. "We are also concerned by the continued eagerness of Russia's cash-strapped defense, biotechnology, chemical, aerospace and nuclear industries to raise funds via exports and transfers — which makes Russian expertise an attractive target for countries and groups seeking W.M.D. and missile-related assistance." <font size=4> The Iraq Survey Group, the United States team that has hunted for evidence of Iraqi weapons of mass destruction, also found indications that Baghdad had received assistance from sources in Ukraine, Belarus and Serbia, according to American officials. <font size=3> In an interim report on the progress of the Iraq Survey Group made public in October, David A. Kay, then the C.I.A.'s chief weapons hunter, reported that his group had found "a large volume of material and testimony by cooperating Iraq officials on Iraq's effort to illicitly procure parts and foreign assistance for its missile program." It listed several examples detailing assistance from foreign countries, but apart from North Korea, no other countries were identified. More than 10 months after the end of major military operations in Iraq, American teams have still not found conclusive evidence that Iraq had any chemical, biological or nuclear weapons, raising doubts about one of the Bush administration's main arguments for going to war. Since he resigned from his post last month, Dr. Kay has said he believes that Iraq largely abandoned the production of weapons of mass destruction after the first gulf war, and that it gradually destroyed its remaining stockpiles during the 1990's. But Dr. Kay has said the evidence shows that Iraq tried to keep upgrading its ballistic missiles even as its other weapons programs were stalling out. In interviews with Iraqi scientists, examinations of documents and other sources, the Iraq Survey Group has determined that Iraq was actively seeking ways to upgrade its crude missile abilities in order to try to build a rocket fleet that could become a regional threat, reaching American forces based in neighboring countries. American officials now say that the United Nations restrictions that allowed Iraq to keep missiles with ranges of up to 150 kilometers had an unintended effect. From the Iraqi perspective, it meant that it was still legal for Baghdad to continue some missile development activities, since short-range missiles were permitted. By contrast, United Nations sanctions completely banned Iraq from keeping any chemical, biological or nuclear weapons, and it now seems that Iraq eventually abandoned those programs. Taking advantage of the loophole permitting short-range missiles, Iraq sought foreign advice on such technical matters as guidance and airframe systems in order to develop missiles with greater range and accuracy than its previous missiles, according to officials familiar with the intelligence. In his October interim report, Dr. Kay said Iraqi detainees and other sources had told American investigators that beginning in 2000, Mr. Hussein approved efforts to develop ballistic missiles with ranges from 400 to 1,000 kilometers. Still, the evidence gathered by the Iraq Survey Group suggests that Iraq's missile development efforts were poorly organized and ultimately unsuccessful. "They had too many scattered programs, and so they didn't focus their efforts on any one missile," said one person familiar with the intelligence on the matter. When United Nations weapons inspectors returned to Iraq in late 2002 just before the war, they found that Iraq had produced short-range Samoud 2 missiles that had slightly longer ranges than the United Nations sanctions allowed. In the weeks before the war, Iraq agreed to destroy many of those missiles, but those highly publicized actions were not enough to convince the United States that Iraq was in compliance with United Nations sanctions. In fact, the evidence suggests that Iraq was seeking to upgrade to missiles with greater range and accuracy than the older, Scud-based Samoud. <font size=4> After the war, the Iraq Survey Group found evidence that Iraq had agreed to pay North Korea $10 million for technical support to upgrade its ballistic missile program in violation of the sanctions. But American officials believe that North Korea never actually delivered anything to the Iraqis, even though it apparently kept Iraq's $10 million. By contrast, the Iraq Survey Group found evidence that the Russian missile engineers actually did provide technical support for the Iraqis for years. <font size=3> The Bush administration's reluctance to raise publicly the issue of Russian support for Iraq's missile program appears to stem from the White House's effort to cultivate better diplomatic relations with Moscow, particularly in the wake of last year's tensions over the war in Iraq. Russia opposed the war, but President Bush and Mr. Putin have still developed a good personal relationship, and there seems much less residual tension between Washington and Moscow over the war than there does between the United States and France and Germany. Since the Sept. 11 attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, the United States has also appeared more willing to view Russia's fight with separatists in Chechnya as part of the global war on terror. nytimes.com

To: Sully- who wrote (572) 3/15/2007 1:08:35 AM From: Sully-   Respond to of 35834   From Russia with Thugs Vent with Michelle Malkin Hot Air TV hotair.com

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