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Politics : PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: DuckTapeSunroof who wrote (682553)	5/17/2005 4:48:34 PM
From: DuckTapeSunroof	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 769670

US condoned the majority of Iraq's oil smuggling: US 'ignored Iraq oil smuggling' Smuggled oil made 40 times as much as oil-for-food kickbacks The US turned a blind eye to the former Iraq regime's $8bn trade in smuggled oil, a new US Senate report says.... news.bbc.co.uk ...Kickbacks It takes the example of Bayoil, a US oil firm which was indicted by US authorities in April and was allegedly used by the three Russian politicians as a go-between with the Iraqi authorities. According to the report, the firm imported more than 200 million barrels to the US between 2000 and 2002, selling it to US companies and in the process paying $37m in illegal kickbacks to Baghdad. US agencies such as the Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) failed to examine its activities, the report warns, assuming that UN agencies would do the job - despite UN resolutions which clearly made such oversight the responsibility of national governments. In all, US buyers paid more than half the $224m in total kickbacks, the report estimates. 'Facilitation' But it also said that the far bigger smuggling trade was carried out with tacit US approval. Much of the oil went out by land through Turkey and Syria, but much also went by sea. The report takes the example of a series of shipments from the port of Khor al-Amaya in southern Iran in the month before the US-led coalition began its 2003 invasion. Jordan paid $53m in hard currency for 7.7 million barrels on seven tankers, all of which were explicitly allowed to pass by the US naval blockade. "The US was not only aware of Iraqi oil sales which violated UN sanctions and provided the bulk of the illicit money Saddam Hussein obtained from circumventing UN sanctions," the report said. "On occasion, the US actually facilitated the illicit oil sales...."