Oil-for-Terror? There appears to be much worse news to uncover in the Oil-for-Food scandal.

National Review ^ | April 19, 2004 | Claudia Rosett

[quidnunc]

Beyond the billions in graft, smuggling, and lavish living for Saddam Hussein that were the hallmarks of the United Nations Oil-for-Food program in Iraq, there is one more penny yet to drop.

It's time to talk about Oil-for-Terror.

Especially with the U.N.'s own investigation into Oil-for-Food now taking shape, and more congressional hearings in the works, it is high time to focus on the likelihood that Saddam may have fiddled Oil-for-Food contracts not only to pad his own pockets, buy pals, and acquire clandestine arms — but also to fund terrorist groups, quite possibly including al Qaeda.

There are at least two links documented already. Both involve oil buyers picked by Saddam and approved by the U.N. One was a firm with close ties to a Liechtenstein trust that has since been designated by the U.N. itself as "belonging to or affiliated with Al Qaeda." The other was a Swiss-registered subsidiary of a Saudi oil firm that had close dealings with the Taliban during Osama bin Laden's 1990's heyday in Afghanistan.

These cases were reported in a carefully researched story published last June by Marc Perelman of the New York-based Forward, relying not only on interviews, but on corporate-registry documents and U.S. and U.N. terror-watch lists. It was an important dispatch but sank quickly from sight. At that stage, the U.N. was still busy praising its own $100-billion-plus Oil-for-Food program, even while trying quietly to strip out the huge graft overlay from the remaining $10 billion or so in contracts suddenly slated for handover to the U.S.-led Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA). That was shortly before the records kept in Baghdad by Saddam began surfacing in such damning profusion that Secretary-General Kofi Annan was finally forced last month to stop stonewalling and agree to an independent investigation — though just how independent remains to be seen.

As it now appears, Oil-for-Food pretty much evolved into a BCCI with a U.N. label. The stated aim of the program, which ran from 1996-2003, was to reduce the squeeze of sanctions on ordinary Iraqis by allowing Saddam to sell oil strictly to buy food and other relief supplies. As Oil-for-Food worked in practice, however, the program gave Saddam rich opportunity not only to pad his own pockets, but to fund almost anything and anyone else he chose, while the U.N. assured the world that all was well. (For the full saga, see my article in the May issue of Commentary, "The Oil-for-Food Scam: What Did Kofi Annan Know and When Did He Know It?").

-snip-

[pax_et_bonum]

pingggggggggggg

[Coop]

Keep handy for the next time someone whines "But there's no connection between Iraq and Al Qaeda!"

[keysguy]

My big question is will this story ever see the light of day?

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

Need help on a Survey... poll:

Bush administration's assertion .. Iraq is a battleground in the war on terrorism?

[Cap Huff]

I just keep hoping that this story makes the big time. It is not going to go away, but how long can this stinking pile just lay there with all the media acting like it isn't there?

[Coop]

Part of the question is why is the Administration and GOP staying away from it?

[Bigg Red]

The wisest move by the U.N., the U.S., or any other authority with full access to these records, would be to make them fully public — thus recruiting help from observers worldwide, not least the media, in digging through the hazardous waste left by Oil-for-Food.


***
Yeah, like that's going to happen when many at the UN had their fat fingers in the cookie jar themselves.

***

One was the U.N. decision to allow Saddam to choose his own buyers of oil and suppliers of goods — an arrangement that Annan himself helped set up during negotiations in Baghdad in the mid-1990s, shortly before he was promoted to Secretary-General.

***

Somebody should definitely follow the money on that one. I'd be willing to bet that ol' Koffi made millions on that deal.

[Cap Huff]

That is an excellent question, and perhaps it has to do with that little blurb at the end of one of the articles the other week in which it was insinuated that U.S. appointed members of the CPA were taking money. That part of the story sounded ominous.

[Bigg Red]

flag

[shield]

bmp

[Coop]

That is an excellent question, and perhaps it has to do with that little blurb at the end of one of the articles the other week in which it was insinuated that U.S. appointed members of the CPA were taking money. That part of the story sounded ominous.

I have no idea if it's true, but it would make sense.

[G.Mason]

"My big question is will this story ever see the light of day?"

Your BIG question?

FWIW ... it already has by being brought up.

Now if your asking will anyone give a rats a$$ about it, then that's an entirely different question.

[sgtbono2002]

President Bush is fighting alone, He is getting no help from the GOP. He is getting no campaign help from Senators or Congressmen, No help in legislatiove matters or appointments, The GOP politicians are no friggin good to President Bush.Where are our GOP leaders,hiding under their beds?

[sgtbono2002]

Zell Miller is the best Republican on the Hill.

[Blood of Tyrants]

Ah, the wonderful sound of an M1 Garand ejecting an empty clip.

[BushisTheMan]

I take all the anti-UN articles like this and send them to my previous Italian co-workers -- hoping it gets passed around over there.

The majority of them are not America's friends and they don't like Berlusconi -- which is why I forward them these articles (smile).

[yoe]

Johnfonda Kerry likes the United Nations, thinks our military would do well so serve that august body.

Corruption abounds under Kofie's liberal hand; all one has to do is look at the majority of the membership - power and greed is the rule at the UN., and the elitists who run the place. So it makes perfect sense for the Liberal Democrats and Democratic Socialists of America, all who are elitists, to want the UN to take charge, that lot abandoned their country and its Constitution long ago just as Johnfonda Kerry jettisoned his “band of brothers” as baby killers and worse.

The United Nations deserve JohnFKerry - America does not!

[Coop]

You exaggerate, Sarge.

[sarasota]

We're saving the good stuff for later, after the dust settles from the 9.11 commission?