Free Republic

UNITED NATIONS -- Iraq wants the United Nations to lift all sanctions and stop using the country's oil revenue to pay compensation to victims of the 1991 Gulf War and the salaries of U.N. weapons inspectors, Iraq's U.N. ambassador said Tuesday. Ambassador Samir Sumaidaie called sanctions "anachronistic and inappropriate" and said it's time for the Security Council to recognize that Iraq is a "much more internationally friendly" country that wants to be at peace with its neighbors. No longer needed, he said, was the U.N. Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission, which was responsible for dismantling Iraqi programs to build chemical...

If anybody wondered why the sainted United Nations, France, Russia and Syria joined forces in trying to block the U.S. from ousting the brutal Saddam Hussein regime in Iraq the answer is now becoming clear; they feared exposure of the corruption into which they had dragged the now-infamous Oil for Food program. That program was meant to allow Saddam to sell a certain amount of oil outside of the bounds of the UN sanctions. The proceeds, handled by the UN, were to be used to buy food and medicine and other basic necessities for the Iraqi people, thus keeping the...

Americans and Russians are getting ready for the joint oil summit. A suggestion from Russian oil giant LUKOIL is expected to be the major sensation of the summit. LUKOIL will present a project to build an up-to-date oil terminal at a Murmansk port. Experts believe that the oil terminal project has already become a symbol of Russian and American relations. The new terminal will allow Russian oil to be delivered directly to the USA. Russian oil manufacturers are about to face the perspective of breaking into one of the most solvent and richest world markets.