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What Wilson Didn’t Say About AfricaJoseph Wilson's Silent PartnersBy Fedora with help from a few FReeper friends Former ambassador Joseph Wilson has been a leading spokesman for critics who accuse President Bush of basing his case for war against Iraq on forged documents purporting that Iraq attempted to buy uranium from Niger. Wilson’s charge has been discredited by a Senate investigation,1 but what remains unanswered are questions arising from what is now known about French intelligence’s role in pushing the forged documents on British and US intelligence. The role of France and Wilson in undermining Bush’s case for war looks...

Iran's Oil Mafia April 16, 2007 Frontpagemagazine.com Hassan Daioleslam Robert William (Bob) Ney is a current federal prisoner and a former Ohio Congressman from 1995 until November 3, 2006. Ney pled guilty to charges of conspiracy and making false statements in relation to the Jack Abramoff lobbying and bribery scandal. Ney reportedly received bribes from Abramoff, other lobbyists, and two foreign businessmen - a felon and an arms dealer - in exchange for using his position to advance their interests. Conspicuously missing from this dossier of disservice to the country was Ney’s assistance in the creation of a Washington-based lobbying...

Tony Rezko's former development partner is broke. ### Dan Mahru -- a lawyer who became an ice peddler and real estate developer -- has filed for bankruptcy, declaring that he and his business partners, including Rezko, owe as much as $95 million to creditors. Mahru estimates his personal debts could be as high as $50 million. Mahru and Rezko split a few years ago. But they're still fighting dozens of lawsuits filed over housing developments they built. "I couldn't handle all the multitude of lawsuits involving Mr. Rezko,'' Mahru says. Mahru lists $48,970.61 in assets in the bankruptcy case he...

May 29, 2008 By Andrew Walden (Hawai'i Free Press) Nadhmi Auchi, seen here with the Governor of Illinois, Rob Blagojevich (middle) at a 2004 Chicago dinner in Auchi's honor arranged by Antonin Rezko (potentially, right)[1]. All three men have been convicted of corruption related charges (Auchi 2003, Rezko 2008, Blagojevich 2009).[2] “A British-Iraqi billionaire lent millions of dollars to Barack Obama's fundraiser (dual US-Syrian citizen Tony Rezko) 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,...

<p>Fox news ran stories last night based on some of the things we were tracking right here in this post. Here is their on line story.</p> <p>As unfinished as my research is, I feel compelled to release what I've found so far as the story cannot wait any longer.  I am not looking for a scoop on anyone or anything, but at the same time I don't want anyone thinking I made this stuff up after the fact either.</p>

x-Fed Chief to Lead New Economic Panel of Outside Experts Who Will Brief Obama President-elect Barack Obama appointed former Federal Reserve Chairman Paul Volcker on Wednesday to be the chairman of a new White House advisory board tasked with helping to lift the nation from recession and stabilize financial markets. University of Chicago economist Austan Goolsbee, one of Mr. Obama's longest-serving policy advisers, will serve as the board's staff director, along with his duties as a member of the White House Council of Economic Advisers. Members of the panel will be drawn from a cross-section of citizens outside the government,...

The Obama Files by John Batchelor What you need to measure about Barack Obama, a likely potent adversary for the presidency, is that while he is a politically junior and consciously liberal-voting member of the U.S. Senate, he is actually a veteran Chicago politician with a fertile record of surprising associations in controversial events well apart from his work in legislatures. Some few of these associations from his years in Chicago law work and urban development, and from his career in the Springfield, Illinois senate, speak to the quality of his judgment and to the strength of his character. Four...

Newly released documents from the Bush administration show that a former member of Saddam Hussein's inner circle has resurfaced inside the new Iraqi government, bringing charges of corruption, bribery and bid-rigging. As a result, millions of U.S. aid dollars and billions in Iraqi government funds have disappeared in an ongoing scandal that is poised to engulf Baghdad and Washington. Worse still, a leading candidate for the top elected post in Iraq has also been implicated in the report as having taken "payoffs" in order to rig a major government cell phone contract. According to a May 2004 U.S. Defense Department...

The Oil-for-Food Scandal – the Canadian Connection Charles R. Smith Tuesday, Jan. 18, 2005 "Its all about the oil" was the chant issued by a vast army of protesters around the world. Yes, it may have been "all about the oil" – but it didn't involve Americans, who did not own any of the oil in Iraq, but rather a horde of rich global fat cats who wanted to make millions in a so-called U.N. humanitarian program. One of those who made out like a bandit is a rich Canadian whose bank made millions and whose Paris-based holding companies include...

Executives at French oil major Total have been detained for questioning as part of an investigation into transfers of millions of dollars in suspected bribes to win oil development rights in Russia and Iraq. A spokeswoman for Total, the world's fourth-largest publicly traded oil company by market value, confirmed by telephone from Paris on Monday that French investigators had raided the company's headquarters and questioned several employees last week. But she said the probe targeted the activities of officials and not the company itself, and declined to comment further. A spokeswoman for the French Justice Ministry refused to comment Monday....

March 16, 2004 -- MANY Americans are convinced even today that the war in Iraq was all about oil. And they're right - but oil was the key for French President Jacques Chirac, not for the United States. In documents I obtained during an investigation of the French relationship to Saddam Hussein, the French interest in maintaining Saddam Hussein in power was spelled out in excruciating detail. The price tag: close to $100 billion. That was what French oil companies stood to profit in the first seven years of their exclusive oil arrangements - had Saddam remained in power. The...

Beijing — Less than two months after stepping down as prime minister, Jean Chretien is moving quickly to forge a relationship with China's wealthiest and most powerful business conglomerate. Making a surprisingly speedy entrance onto the global business stage, Mr. Chretien will arrive in China this weekend with a team of Power Corp. executives to meet some of China's most influential business leaders. The visit, his first major overseas trip since his retirement, is being kept hush-hush. Neither the Canadian embassy in Beijing nor his law office in Ottawa is revealing any details of the visit, insisting that it is...

Paris – A French prosecutor is examining whether to prosecute US Vice President Dick Cheney over alleged complicity in the abuse of corporate assets dating from the time he was head of the services company Halliburton, the French newspaper Le Figaro said on Saturday. The case stems from a contract by a consortium including the American company Kellogg, Brown and Root (KBR), a Halliburton subsidiary, and a French company, Technip, to supply a gas complex to Nigeria, the newspaper reported. A Paris investigating magistrate has been conducting investigations since October into allegations that $180m were paid in secret commissions during...

France’s longest-running political and corporate corruption scandal ended yesterday with prison sentences and fines for 23 former executives at the Elf oil company and their associates.Loik le Floch-Prigent, 57, Elf’s chief executive between 1989 and 1993, authorised the embezzlement of £210 million while Elf was state-owned. The money went on bribes for politicians and middlemen and lavish lifestyles for senior Elf executives.He was jailed for five years and fined £260,000.Nadhmi Auchi, a British billionaire, was given a two-year suspended prison sentence and fined £1.4 million. Auchi, who fled his native Iraq under Saddam Hussein, was found guilty of accepting illegal...

OTTAWA (Reuters) - The Canadian government, under increasing pressure over allegations it ignores the plight of citizens jailed abroad, came under ferocious attack on Thursday from a businessman who said Ottawa had abandoned him when he was on death row in Saudi Arabia. William Sampson savaged officials at both the Canadian foreign ministry and the embassy in Riyadh, saying they had made clear to him from the start that they considered he was guilty of setting off a bomb that killed a Briton. "Throughout my incarceration I consider the activities of the embassy officials fell well short of anything that...

PARIS - French oil giant TotalFinaElf reported Tuesday a 48 percent jump in profit in the first quarter, boosted by high oil prices, and said it was changing its name to Total in an effort to revamp its image. Chairman Thierry Desmarest also said the group stands "a good chance" of taking part in the future development of Iraqi oil fields despite Paris' opposition to the U.S.-led invasion that toppled Saddam Hussein's regime. Speaking at the annual shareholders' meeting in Paris, Desmarest conceded that TotalFinaElf will find it harder to secure contracts than its American and British rivals. But, he...

Canadian Alliance foreign affairs critic Stockwell Day yesterday questioned whether Jean Chrétien's family associations had any bearing on the government's decision to stay out of the recent war against Iraq. "I do not fault the prime minister's ties with his nephew (Raymond) our ambassador to France," Mr. Day said in the Commons, "or with Paul Desmarais Sr., who is the largest individual shareholder of France's largest corporation, TotalFinaElf, which has billions of dollars of contracts with Saddam's former regime." Mr. Chrétien's only daughter, France, is married to André Desmarais, son of the controlling shareholder of Montreal-based Power Corp., one of...

UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - In a surprise move, France on Tuesday backed an immediate suspension of U.N. sanctions against Iraq, meeting the United States half way in its drive to get the embargoes lifted. But France's U.N. ambassador, Jean-Marc de la Sabliere, said the U.N. oil-for-food program, which collects Iraq's oil revenues, should be kept under U.N. control for the time being but adjusted to Iraq's current needs. "We should immediately suspend the sanctions," de la Sabliere said. "And about the oil-for-food program, we think there should be some adjustment to the program with a view to phasing out this...

WASHINGTON (AFP) - Senior aides to US President George W. Bush met this week to consider ways to punish France for its opposition to the war on Iraq, including sidelining Paris at NATO and limiting its participation in transatlantic forums, officials said. Participants in the meeting, held Monday at the White House after a similar gathering last week was postponed, did not arrive at any decisions but are expected to gather again, possibly next week, in an effort to reach consensus, the officials said. The officials, speaking to AFP on condition of anonymity, said Vice President Dick Cheney's office had...

<p>PARIS (Reuters) - French oil company TotalFinaElf does not expect to be frozen out of oil contracts in Iraq despite France's tough opposition to the U.S.-led war, the firm's chief of exploration and production said Tuesday.</p> <p>In an interview with the newspaper Le Figaro, Christophe de Margerie dismissed rumors Total was on a "black list" of firms that will be denied lucrative contracts in post-war Iraq, although he stressed the firm remains vigilant.</p>