lot’s more at website including:
A February 28, 2008 Sun-Times article describes another part of Auchi’s 2004 Chicago visit:
On a spring day in 2004, Nadhmi Auchi, one of the world’s richest men, flew in to Midway Airport on a private jet. Met by a welcoming party that included Lt. Gov. Pat Quinn (there at the request of the Blagojevich administration) and businessman Tony Rezko, Auchi was brought to a downtown hotel where he was the guest of honor at a reception hosted by Blagojevich.
The Iraqi-born billionaire — who lives in London — had come to Chicago on business. He would go on to invest nearly $170 million in a prime piece of vacant land in the South Loop — 62 acres along the Chicago River that Rezko wanted to develop….
Auchi has sought to distance himself from Rezko — but still plans to develop the 62 acres at Roosevelt and Clark. Asked about the project, Pepper referred questions to a Feb. 12 story posted on the Web site Newsmax.com.
“As negative information about Rezko came to light last year, GMH moved to buy out Rezko’s interest” in the project, Newsmax reported. “In July 2007, Rezko sold the majority of his interest.”
That is how Newsmax reports on Auchi since Ruddy’s 2005-2006 “conversion.” But the office of US Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald sees it differently. In their Motion for Issuance for an Arrest Warrant against Rezko, prosecutors argue:
“(a)ccording to Northern Trust bank records, on April 4, 2007, a bank account, (the ‘MMDA account’) held at Northern trust by the law firm of Freeborn and Peters (Freeborn) received an incoming wire transfer of approximately $3,499,471 from a bank in Beirut, Lebanon. The originator of the wire transfer was identified as General Mediterranean Holdings.…”
Prosecutors consume the next 10 pages detailing the various persons, many with criminal ties, to whom Rezko transferred the money. They then write:
“Of the remaining money from the $3.5 million wire from Beirut, Lebanon, nearly all of it went to Rezko-related lawyers.”
Prosecutors also detail another GMH wire transfer for $200,000 on July 25, 2007 which they indicate “was also apparently for Rezko’s legal fees….”
Newsmax somehow missed all of this.
6) Carter-Ruck asserts: “Our client flatly and categorically denies any wrong doing in relation to matters that led to his conviction in France. Our client has appealed to the European Court of Human Rights for a ruling that the trial resulting in his conviction breached his fundamental right to a fair trial. He is also suing Elf Oil for dragging him unwittingly into the scandal.”
C-R thus confirms Auchi is a convicted criminal in the eyes of French law. The astute reader will note that challenging the fairness of a trial is different than proclaiming innocence. The challenge to Elf also implies an admission that Auchi was dragged “into the scandal” albeit “unwittingly”.
Here’s how the UK Independent May 4, 2008 describes it:
A legal battle between the two erupted after Auchi, an Iraqi-born British citizen, received a 15-month suspended sentence and a £1.5m fine after being convicted of corruption. French investigators found that he had received $2m (£1m) in illegal commissions in the Elf Aquitaine oil scandal.
Several senior executives of the company were jailed over their part in the affair. The investigators claimed that Auchi had paid bribes to Elf. As a result of the ruling, Total took legal action against him in France.
Then C-R closes by reiterating several of the points it has already made:
7) Carter-Ruck asserts: “With regard to the article by Nick Cohen of the Guardian, following legal action taken by our client against Guardian News and Media Limited also agreed to pay a substantial sum in relation to our client’s costs. In particular:
(a) Carter-Ruck asserts: “as stated above, it is untrue that our client had any involvement with Saddam Hussein.”
If so, then Auchi’s lawyers would logically have to claim:
· The 1960 US Embassy report: “untrue.”
· Numerous reports that Auchi was involved in the purchase of Italian frigates for the Iraqi Navy during the Iran-Iraq war: “untrue.”
· Money laundering: “untrue.”
Who is to be believed? A twice-convicted criminal and ex-con whose lawyers shout “untrue” and attempt to silence those who say otherwise— or the dozens of investigative journalists, European and American government officials, and UN investigators who have dug into aspects of Auchi’s story.
(b) Carter-Ruck asserts: “it is untrue that our client was involved in bribing ‘fabulously corrupt leaders of postwar Italy.’”
In 2003, in one of the articles forced off the Internet by Carter-Ruck’s threats, Nick Cohen of the UK Guardian wrote:
“Allow me to introduce you to Nadhmi Auchi. He was charged in the 1950s with being an accomplice of Saddam Hussein, when the future tyrant was acquiring his taste for blood. He was investigated in the 1980s for his part in alleged bribes to the fabulously corrupt leaders of post-war Italy.”
Under threat of litigation, the Guardian admitted to “inaccuracies” in the articles. But is it an “inaccuracy” to acknowledge that the twice-convicted criminal and ex-con Auchi was indeed “investigated in the 1980s”?
Lucy Komisar details the contents of “a confidential 2001 report by Kroll, the international investigative agency…commissioned by Kuwait after the Gulf War in an attempt to locate Iraqi assets it could claim as compensation.”
Komisar explains:
Same source, too relative,must copy this too:
British-Iraqi billionaire lent millions of dollars to Barack Obama’s fundraiser just weeks before an imprudent land deal that has returned to haunt the presidential contender, an investigation by The Times discloses.
The money transfer raises the question of whether funds from Nadhmi Auchi, one of Britain’s wealthiest men, helped Mr Obama buy his mock Georgian mansion in Chicago.
A company related to Mr Auchi, who has a conviction for corruption in France, registered the loan to Mr Obama’s bagman Antoin “Tony” Rezko on May 23 2005. Mr Auchi says the loan, through the Panamanian company Fintrade Services SA, was for $3.5 million.
Three weeks later, Mr Obama bought a house on the city’s South Side while Mr Rezko’s wife bought the garden plot next door from the same seller on the same day, June 15.…
Mrs Rezko’s purchase and sale of the land to Mr Obama raises many unanswered questions.
It is unclear how Mrs Rezko could have afforded the down payment of $125,000 and a $500,000 mortgage for the original $625,000 purchase of the garden plot at 5050 South Greenwood Ave.
In a sworn statement a year later, Mrs Rezko said she got by on a salary of $37,000 and had $35,000 assets. Mr Rezko told a court he had “no income, negative cash flow, no liquid assets, no unencumbered assets [and] is significantly in arrears on many of his obligations.”
Asked if she used money from her husband to buy the land next to Mr Obama’s house, she said: “I can’t answer these questions, I’m sorry.”
Asked how long she and her husband had known Mr Auchi, she replied: “I will not be able to answer this question.”
Mr Auchi’s lawyer, asked whether the Fintrade Services loan was used to buy the land which became Mr Obama’s garden, stated: “No, not as far as my client is aware.”
Although the Carter-Ruck letter did not touch on the issue, Auchi is also alleged to have involvement with several questionable business deals in the new Iraq. A 146 page report to the Pentagon Inspector General posted on Wikileaks is described by Washington Times investigative journalist Bill Gertz who writes:
A 2004 Pentagon report obtained by The Washington Times identified Auchi as a global arms dealer and Iraqi billionaire “who, behind the facade of legitimate business, served as Saddam Hussein’s principle international financial manipulator and bag man.”
The report to the Pentagon inspector general stated that “significant