Posted on 10/25/2004 8:16:38 PM PDT by NormsRevenge
PARIS (Reuters) - Paris will deliver confidential documents to U.N. investigators to refute charges in a report published on a CIA (news - web sites) Web site that French firms abused the U.N.'s oil-for-food program in Iraq (news - web sites), officials said on Monday.
The report by a former U.N. weapons inspector implicated leading French companies and politicians in a strategy by Saddam Hussein (news - web sites) to bribe his way clear of U.N. sanctions.
Officials said Paris protested in vain to Washington over the Oct. 7 report by Charles Duelfer, whose CIA-led Iraq Survey Group (ISG) found Iraq did not possess weapons of mass destruction but was engaged in a scheme to amass funds to help him undermine sanctions and buy equipment to restart such programs.
Duelfer published a list of companies, individuals and political parties said to have received kickbacks or paid surcharges on oil that was underpriced.
"It is regrettable that the ISG has made assertions that are not in any way backed up, and the report (itself) recognizes that," Foreign Ministry spokesman Herve Ladsous told a briefing.
A French diplomatic official said: "(The report makes) very damaging allegations and the important point is that none of these allegations were checked, either with the individuals or the companies or the countries concerned.
"The very fact that no American citizens or entities are at any point mentioned ... is a reflection of an awareness of the flimsiness of these allegations."
French officials, making their first response to the report on Monday, said Paris had told Paul Volker, a former U.S. Federal Reserve (news - web sites) chairman heading an independent U.N. investigation, it was "ready to declassify some confidential documents" on the oil-for-food scheme.
France was not a major trading partner with Iraq either in terms of oil or contracts passed under the oil-for-food scheme, designed to provide relief to Saddam's sanctions-bound Iraq.
French officials say 20 percent of the $3 billion of "French contracts" flagged in the Duelfer report in fact went to French subsidiaries of U.S. firms, notably General Electric ($445 million) and Halliburton ($127 million).
A further 20 percent involved French companies buying U.S.-equipment for contracts in Iraq.
"French contracts" averaged only 8 percent of the total, far behind Russia, Egypt and Jordan and on a par with China, Turkey and Australia.
Halliburton -- headed by Dick Cheney (news - web sites) before he became U.S. vice president -- is to be the subject of a special audit of some $1.5 billion sole-source Pentagon (news - web sites) contracts placed with the Texas-based firm and paid for with Iraqi oil money.
France had immediately suspended the contract with one French firm suspected of wrongdoing. But France was unable to pursue the case because British and U.S. customs had failed to respond to French requests for information, they said.
French-U.S. relations remain at a low ebb as a result of Paris's outspoken opposition to the U.S.-led war in Iraq and splits on the U.N. role in rebuilding Iraq. French officials refused to link the Duelfer report directly to President Bush (news - web sites)'s re-election campaign but hinted it might be a factor.
Privately one official said it aimed to divert attention from the report's key finding that Iraq had no illegal weapons programs -- the main U.S. justification for the conflict.
Others saw a more sinister motive. They pointed to strong anti-French feeling in America and campaign jibes by some Republican leaders targeting Democratic presidential challenger John Kerry (news - web sites), who has family ties to France.
Sure they will.
Make sure they bring the records for the BANK in PARIS that the money went through.
Croak away, frogs.
let me guess.... their from a kinkos in abilene tx....... and they in times roman....
will lgf check this out....
MSM "out".
Halliburton Halliburton Halliburton Halliburton Halliburton Halliburton Halliburton Halliburton Halliburton Halliburton
They are french ran us companies...try again frogs...
With apologies to Apocolypse Now!
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