Marc Rich tied to Iraq oil New York Daily News ^ | 12/02/04 | Bill Hutchinson
x-fugitive Marc Rich is suspected of having become one of Saddam Hussein's middlemen in Iraq's illegal oil trade just a month after he won a controversial pardon from former President Bill Clinton, a news report said.
ABC News reported last night that Rich's alleged role in the growing UN oil-for-food scandal is under investigation by federal officials. Rich, who was pardoned by Clinton in January 2001, and several other prominent oil traders are suspected of making illegal kickbacks to Iraq to win the lucrative oil contracts, the network reported. The UN program was set up in 1996 to help Iraqis get food, medicine and other items that had been scarce under sanctions imposed after the 1991 Persian Gulf War. But investigators say Saddam realized more than $21billion under the program through kickbacks and other scams. Rich fled the U.S. in 1986 while facing tax evasion charges.
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