AP EXCLUSIVE: Iraqis reveal in secret interviews how Saddam manipulated oil-for-food program
Interviews with dozens of former and current Iraqi officials by congressional investigators have produced new evidence that Saddam Hussein micro-managed business deals under the U.N. oil-for-food program to maximize political influence with important foreign governments like Russia and neighboring Arab states.
The Iraqi officials, who were flown outside of Iraq for their own safety during the interviews, provided a list of foreign companies favored by Saddam and his top lieutenants for import contracts under the U.N. program. They also revealed a parallel blacklist of companies that the then-Iraq leader disqualified from getting deals, investigators told The Associated Press.
The precaution of redoubled secrecy comes after an Iraqi official involved in the oil-for-food investigation of corruption died in a car bombing in late June after speaking with investigators from the House International Relations Committee. The official, Ehsan Karim, who headed the Iraqi Finance Ministry’s audit board, was interviewed in Amman, Jordan, on May 21.
The Iraqi officials also helped investigators identify Iraqi front companies, which operated abroad to solicit and process alleged bribes from foreign companies and to help facilitate imports for the Iraqi government, including dual-use military goods such as vehicles.
There’s some pretty damning stuff in this article. Seems it was more than just oil vouchers involved. This new list is in addition to the oil voucher list.
But the new lists obtained by AP of both companies favored and spurned by the Iraqi government are a more overt illustration of Saddam’s manipulation of the program.
One investigator described the exempt list as the equivalent of the list in Duelfer’s report of oil voucher recipients, but in this case for goods imported under the U.N. program.
Interesting stuff indeed. Link via Hell in a Handbasket.
