[heretic]

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1068890/posts


This story was broken a long time ago. It's a shame something as important as this ^^^ had been ignored until recently.


before you discredit the source, just google al-mada list

[heretic]

kazan, I figured you'd have a comment

[Gank]

Disregarding the credability of freerepublic how credible is Al-mada themselves? Afaik private individuals selling millions of barrels on the market doesnt happen every day and surely somebody would have noticed somebody like the Russian Orthodox Church selling a couple of million barrels. I think its being ignored because its not really very plausible and people suspect its an attempt to blacken the names of those who opposed the war.

[Gank]

Bear in mind also the whole Iraqi oil industry was under the control of the UN so the odds of Saddam actually having any say where it went are slim.

[heretic]

Al-Mada is not as radical as Al-J but they're hardly on good terms with the U.S. (so to speak)

I hope these articles help:

AP article:

Congress to investigate claims of Saddam's oil-for-food bribery

By Anne Penketh, Diplomatic Editor
19 April 2004

An American congressional panel will begin hearings this week into charges that Saddam Hussein bribed officials around the world with billions of dollars from the United Nations' oil-for-food programme.

The timing of the hearing could not be worse for the UN, as the embarrassing charges of laxity will be aired as it prepares to return to Iraq after the 30 June handover to interim Iraqi authorities.

The fraud allegations that have surfaced so far are only the "tip of the iceberg", said Claude Hankes-Drielsma, a British adviser to the Iraq Governing Council, who will testify before Congress on Wednesday.

"A private company in Jordan received a profit of $97m in the month prior to the liberation. Why? Hopefully, the investigation will show," Mr Hankes-Drielsma said.

On Friday the UN secretary general, Kofi Annan, named Paul Volcker, a former US Federal Reserve chairman, to head a UN investigation into the allegations that senior UN officials may have received kickbacks from the Iraqis. Benon Sevan, who ran the oil-for-food programme, is accused of having been allocated 14.2 million barrels of oil. Mr Sevan denies any wrongdoing.

The UN and congressional inquiries into the oil-for-food programme stem from the publication in January of a list of 270 individuals, companies and institutions that allegedly received money from Saddam's regime, in return for their political support. The list included British, Russian and French politicians and business leaders. The Security Council, which was made aware of the accusations, apparently did nothing to stop the corrupt practices.

The oil-for-food programme was launched under the sanctions regime in 1996 to alleviate the plight of the Iraqi people with food and medicine, while ensuring that Iraqi oil money was not spent on weapons that could threaten its neighbours.

The supposedly watertight, UN-controlled scheme established, in effect, a UN trusteeship in Iraq. Revenues from limited oil exports were held in an escrow account. The UN sanctions committee, consisting of all 15 members of the Security Council, had to unanimously approve the contracts, and UN monitors were dispatched to Iraq to ensure the proper distribution of the goods.

However, as a former Iraqi ambassador put it: "No one told us we couldn't cheat." The loophole was Iraq's ability to choose its buyers and suppliers.

A total of $67bn (£37bn) went through the account before the oil-for-food programme was wound up after the war. The US General Accounting Office estimated last month that Saddam raised $5.7bn from oil smuggling and $4.4bn by extracting illicit surcharges and kickbacks through the oil-for-food scheme.

The Iraqis are accused of handing out bribes, in the form of vouchers for millions of barrels of oil, to individuals and organisations for their support of the regime. Illegal surcharges of "no less than 10 per cent"were levied by the Iraqis, while food unfit for human consumption is alleged to have been traded for oil.

"There will be a very clear pattern of countries - including members of the Security Council - which were benefiting significantly," said Mr Hankes-Drielsma, a former chairman of the management committee of PriceWaterhouse & Partners. He singled out France and Russia, two members of the Security Council which opposed the war on Iraq.

But he also recognised that the Americans turned a blind eye to the blatant oil smuggling by Iraq through Turkey - a Nato ally - for political reasons.

• The US has sent investigators to Iraq to look into allegations of bribery linked to the awarding of contracts by the Coalition Provisional Authority since the official end of the war.

http://news.independent.co.uk/img/f...travel_logo.gif

-----

U.N. Endorses Iraq Oil-For-Food Probe

By EDITH M. LEDERER, Associated Press Writer

UNITED NATIONS - Security Council members agreed on a resolution to back an investigation of the U.N. oil-for-food program that U.S. lawmakers have said allowed billions of dollars in illegal oil revenue to flow to Saddam Hussein, a United Nations spokesman said Tuesday

U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan, who sought the inquiry, must now formally appoint the three-man independent inquiry panel. The council will then adopt the resolution.

U.S. Federal Reserve chairman Paul Volcker, slated to be chairman of the panel, insisted on a resolution setting out the inquiry's aims before he would agree to head the investigation.

Letters from Annan appointing Volcker, former Yugoslav war crimes prosecutor Richard Goldstone of South Africa, and Swiss criminal law professor Mark Pieth, were to be sent late Tuesday or early Wednesday, U.N. spokesman Fred Eckhard said.

Eckhard said he expected the official announcement about the creation of the panel on Wednesday.

Under the oil-for-food program, which began in December 1996 and ended in November, the former Iraqi regime could sell unlimited quantities of oil provided the money went primarily to buy humanitarian goods and pay reparations to victims of the 1991 Gulf War.

Saddam's government decided on the goods it wanted, who should provide them, and who could buy Iraqi oil — but a U.N. committee monitored the contracts.

The U.S. General Accounting Office, Congress' investigative arm, estimated in March that the Iraqi government pocketed $5.7 billion by smuggling oil to its neighbors and $4.4 billion by extracting illicit surcharges and kickbacks on otherwise legitimate contracts.

The allegations of corruption first surfaced last January in the Iraqi newspaper Al-Mada. The newspaper had a list of about 270 former government officials, activists and journalists from more than 46 countries suspected of profiting from Iraqi oil sales that were part of the U.N. program.

The draft resolution calls on the U.S.-led coalition now running Iraq, the Iraqis themselves, and all 191 U.N. member states and their regulatory authorities "to cooperate fully by all appropriate means with the inquiry."

Annan launched an internal inquiry in February but canceled it in March to allow a broader, independent examination.

Many U.S. lawmakers, who are conducting their own investigation, have expressed skepticism about the U.N.'s ability to create an independent panel that could implicate some of its own high-ranking officials.

U.S. diplomats pressed for an American to lead the panel, and backed Volcker, who has a reputation for integrity and fairness.

The draft resolution expresses the council's desire for "a full and fair investigation" of efforts by the former Iraqi government to evade U.N. sanctions and provisions of the oil-for-food program "through bribery, kickbacks, surcharges on oil sales and illicit payments."

It states "that any illicit activity by United Nations officials, personnel and agents, as well as contractors, including entities that have entered into contracts under the program, is unacceptable."

[heretic]

ABC Scoop on UN Scandal: "Monumental Rip-Off?"
Apr 21, 2004
Brian Ross


April 20 — At least three senior United Nations officials are suspected of taking multi-million dollar bribes from the Saddam Hussein regime, U.S. and European intelligence sources tell ABCNEWS.

One year after his fall, U.S. officials say they have evidence, some in cash, that Saddam diverted to his personal bank accounts approximately $5 billion from the United Nations Oil-for-Food program.

In what has been described as the largest humanitarian aid effort ever undertaken, the U.N. Oil-for-Food program began in 1996 to help Iraqis who were suffering under sanctions imposed following the first Gulf War.

The program allowed Iraq to sell limited amounts of oil, under supposedly tight U.N. supervision, to finance the purchase of much-needed humanitarian goods.

Most prominent among those accused in the scandal is Benon Sevan, the Cyprus-born U.N. undersecretary general who ran the program for six years.

In an interview with ABCNEWS last year, Sevan denied any wrongdoing.

"Well, I can tell you there have been no allegations about me," he said. "Maybe you can try to dig it out." And in a Feb. 10 statement, Sevan challenged those making the allegations to "come forward and provide the necessary documentary evidence" and present it to U.N. investigators.

But documents have surfaced in Baghdad, in the files of the former Iraqi Oil Ministry, allegedly linking Sevan to a pay-off scheme in which some 270 prominent foreign officials received the right to trade in Iraqi oil at cut-rate prices.

"It's almost like having coupons of bonds or shares. You can sell those coupons to other people who are normal oil traders," said Claude Hankes-Drielsma, a British adviser to the Iraq Governing Council.

Investigators say the smoking gun is a letter to former Iraqi oil minister Amer Mohammed Rasheed, obtained by ABCNEWS and not yet in the hands of the United Nations.

[heretic]

AFP article:

Annan on defensive over fraud charges in UN Iraq oil scheme

Wed Apr 28, 2:32 PM ET

UNITED NATIONS (AFP) - UN Secretary General Kofi Annan hit back at the media over allegations of widespread fraud and corruption in the UN programme that oversaw Saddam Hussein's oil sales in Iraq.

With a brewing scandal enveloping the United Nations over the programme, a defensive Annan blamed "outrageous" press reports about the affair and also took a swipe at the United States and Britain.

"If you read the reports it looks as if the Saddam regime had nothing to do with it. They did nothing wrong, it was all the UN," he told reporters in some of his bluntest comments yet on the matter.

"Some of the comments that I have been read have been constructive and thoughtful. Others have been rather outrageous and exaggerated," he said.

Annan has already appointed an independent enquiry headed by former US Federal Reserve banking chief Paul Volcker to look into the oil-for-food programme, which was the largest aid scheme in UN history.

The programme, which closed last year, has been dogged by allegations of bribes and kickbacks, including a US television report last week accusing the director and two other top UN officials of getting payoffs from Saddam.

Oil-for-food allowed Iraq use its oil revenues to buy humanitarian supplies in a bid to ease the effects of sanctions slapped on Baghdad over its 1990 invasion of Kuwait.

UN monitoring was intended to ensure that the revenues went for aid. In January, a Baghdad newspaper published a list of hundreds of individuals said to have got payoffs by the regime.

Meanwhile the US government says Saddam and his associates may have pocketed around 10 billion dollars, including more than five billion from smuggled oil sold outside the rules of the programme.

"We had no mandate to stop oil smuggling," Annan said. "There was no way the UN could have stopped it."

He said some of the smuggling was done overland in trucks through northern Iraq, where the United States and Britain at the time patrolled a "no-fly" zone -- and a similar zone in the south -- that kept the regime hemmed in.

"They were driving the trucks through northern Iraq to Turkey," Annan said. "The US and the British had planes in the air. We were not there. Why is all this being dumped on the UN?"

Annan has also been put on the defensive because of revelations that his son Kojo worked for a company, Cotecna, that was contracted to work under the programme.

"There is nothing in the accusations about my son. He joined the company even before I became secretary general," the UN chief said. "Neither he nor I had anything to do with the contract for Cotecna."

Oil-for-food was launched in December 1996 and was terminated in November. Its director, Benon Sevan, has denied any wrongdoing.

Annan recalled that the day-to-day monitoring of the programme was done by a sub-committee of the 15-nation UN Security Council and not the UN secretariat which he heads.

"All this is dumped on the secretariat. These allegations are doing damage," he said. The inquiry panel has only begun work in the past weeks and will give an initial update on its investigation within three months.

[Gank]

Thats all nice but iirc there was a similar event shortly after the war when a Iraqi newspaper (i think) published official documents implicated the UK labour mp George Galloway of taking kickbacks from Saddam. Documents were later proven to be fakes. The fact that more or less everyone who opposed the war is accused is a bit to pat for me.

Al-Mada is not as radical as Al-J but they're hardly on good terms with the U.S. (so to speak)

How do you know this? Its a newspaper with a small circulation in Bagdhad only and its printed in Arabic. Have you copies of it or something?

[heretic]

Originally posted by Gank
Thats all nice but iirc there was a similar event shortly after the war when a Iraqi newspaper (i think) published official documents implicated the UK labour mp George Galloway of taking kickbacks from Saddam. Documents were later proven to be fakes. The fact that more or less everyone who opposed the war is accused is a bit to pat for me.

if you loko at what I highlighted, the UN is not denying the allegations, they're trying to play the blame game. methinks this is pretty credible.

 

How do you know this? Its a newspaper with a small circulation in Bagdhad only and its printed in Arabic. Have you copies of it or something?

My job allows me to get things that are difficult to find.

[Gank]

Originally posted by heretic
if you loko at what I highlighted, the UN is not denying the allegations, they're trying to play the blame game. methinks this is pretty credible.

Hes not denying smuggling went on, thats a different thing than saying the list is authentic. What hes actually saying is we know nothing about it, not its somebody elses fault.

Originally posted by heretic
My job allows me to get things that are difficult to find.

OK, I see you have a site with photos of your bike on it, hows about some photos of Al-mana. Dont worry bout the arabic, I have somebody who can translate. I presume thats within your capabilities?

[heretic]

Originally posted by Gank

OK, I see you have a site with photos of your bike on it, hows about some photos of Al-mana. Dont worry bout the arabic, I have somebody who can translate. I presume thats within your capabilities?

I can't tell you anything.


Sorry :hs:

edit: google and you will se the light. I don't do research for others.

[Bobboau]

I've been meaning to bring this up.

[Gank]

Originally posted by heretic
I can't tell you anything.

Figured that. Why cant you tell me anything, because its top secret?  Or because you're talking out of your arse?

Originally posted by heretic
edit: google and you will se the light. I don't do research for others.

Theres no light, just a list published by one of many Baghdad newspapers with little to back it up. The lack of any evidence supporting the claims from the other end makes them look highly dubious. Paper could be the Baghdad news of the world for all we know.

[ionia23]

Wasn't this already old news?  And they're just now getting around to investigating it?

[Gank]

Just fouind an interesting article on Al-mada

The publishing of the “List” alleging to contain names
of persons, parties, organizations and companies to
whom the former Iraqi regime paid “bribes” has
generated a lot of interest in the media, amid denials
and ridicule by some of those whose names were in that
“List”.

It does not surprise me (nor bother me) that MEMRI was
among the first to post the article in English.
Knowing MEMRI’s agenda and that it is a tool for
Zionist propaganda should suffice to understand their
motives. After all, MEMRI only translated an article
published in Arabic in Baghdad by an Iraqi independent
newspaper.

However, MEMRI does add its biased views to the
article. It alleges, without proof or evidence, that
these vouchers may have been issued to pay for goods
that may have included military equipment or military
parts, luxury automobiles that Saddam distributed as
gifts inside and outside Iraq, and general luxury
goods for the benefit of high-ranking officials in the
Ba'ath party and government. MEMRI further alleges
that the sold oil was collected from the Syria
pipeline terminal, which was operating in
contravention of the Security Council sanctions. No
evidence supporting those allegations is given. These
allegations are part of MEMRI’s standard policy aimed
at discrediting anyone who opposes Israel’s policies
in the area.

But how independent is “Al Mada” newspaper?

To understand that, we have to understand who is
behind it.

The founder and Chief Editor of “Al Mada” is Fakhri
Kareem (who used to use the family name ZANGANA
before, but has dropped it recently). Kareem was a
member of the Politburo of the Iraqi Communist Party
and a deputy to 'Aziz Muhammad (then Party Secretary
General). It is worth noting that both Muhammad and
Kareem are of Kurdish origin.

At the end of the 1970s Kareem was subjected to a
Party tribunal after it was disclosed that he had a
relationship with agencies of the Iraqi regime. His
Party membership was suspended. But on the basis of an
individual order from Aziz Muhammad, Kareem was
elevated to membership in the Political Bureau and put
in charge of the Party's finance, propaganda, and
security apparatus. In the 1980s, the party
transformed itself, under the leadership of Muhammad
and Kareem, to a mouthpiece for the chauvinist
tendency within the Kurdish movement.
Fakhri Kareem is accused by his party comrades of
taking possession of the Party's resources, bank
accounts, and propaganda institutions all of which he
registered as his own personal property. With that
money he founded a political magazine in Syria called
“an-Nahj” (the path) in 1983.

In September 1991, Fakhri Kareem accompanied Jalal
Talabani, Secretary General of the Patriotic Union of
Kurdistan (PUK) to the US. The delegation included
Hoshyar Zebari , personal emissary of Mr. Massoud
Barazani (KDP), Rassoul Mamaned, Secretary General of
Kurdish Socialist Party (KSP), Brusk Shaways,
Politburo Member, Kurdistan People’s Democratic Party
(KPDP), Yacoub Yousif, Politburo Member, Assyrian
Democratic Movement (ZOWAA) and  Muzafar Arslan,
Secretary General, Iraqi Turkman People Party. The
group was invited by the U.S. State Department to
Washington, D.C. to “commence a dialogue and establish
a better understanding of the objectives of the
Kurdish opposition to Sadam’s regime in Iraq.” At that
time, Fakhri Kareem made a statement to the Voice of
America radio in which he asked George **** Sr. to
intensify sanctions against the Iraqi people.

Fakhri Kareem is also accused by his comrades of
cooperating with the rulers of Kuwait and the Central
Intelligence Agency in publishing a newspaper under
the title "Sawt al-Kuwayt ad-Dawli" (The International
Voice of Kuwait) which was one of the strongest
advocates of the 30-nation aggression against Iraq in
1991. It was this newspaper that published the
theatrical story of the young Kuwaiti girl Nayirah
under the headline "The Iraqis steal incubators from
the children of Kuwait." As the battles raged, this
newspaper printed stories under huge headlines like
"Coalition forces demolish Baghdad" and "Allied
aircraft exterminate Iraqi military formation near
Basra." Finally the Kuwaiti government got tired of
this newspaper and considered the money allocated to
it a waste of public funds and finally shut it down.
Thus in 1993, Kareem expanded his activities in Syria
and founded a publishing house “Al-Mada Publishing
House” and, together with some of his editors from the
Kuwaiti paper, established a new magazine in Syria
called “al-Mada”. The activities were eventually moved
into luxurious premises in the rich district of
Al-Hamra in Beirut, Lebanon.

The Iraqi Communist Party has, since the 1990s,
splintered into four groups: the ICP Central Committee
and the Kurdistan Communist Party (both of which
support the occupation), the ICP General Command and
the ICP Cadre (both of which oppose the occupation).
The ICP Central Committee’s newspaper "Tariq
ash-Sha'b" reported in July 2002 that the Deputy
Consul in the American Embassy in Damascus visited the
offices of the Iraqi Communist Party in Syria and
discussed recent developments with Party
representatives. In June 2002 the Party's internal
publication, "Munadil al-Hizb"  reported on a special
meeting of the Party Central Committee to study how
the Party would take part in the coming events, which
they termed "the liberation of Iraq." During the
invasion battles in 2003, the Party openly
acknowledged that it had fighters on the front lines
together with the "Coalition Forces."

This background should serve to show the pattern of
behavior. Al Mada is thus seen by Iraqi Communists
opposing the occupation as a CIA financed newspaper,
whose owner has been working for the CIA for over 20
years and is responsible for recruiting other
communists for the agency.

Whether or not the “List” is real or fabricated
remains to be seen, though the history of the US and
UK in Iraq since 1990 has been nothing but a series of
lies and false allegations, causing the deaths of
hundreds of thousands of innocent Iraqis, without even
an admission of guilt. The incubator story and the
WMDs are only small examples of the campaign of
misinformation.

But the timing of publishing the “List” is no
coincidence. It seems to serve several objectives: to
divert the attention from the horrendous crimes
committed by the occupation forces in stark violation
of international laws and conventions; to divert the
attention from the scandals being exposed related to
the stealing of Iraq’s wealth by US companies and by
members of Iraq’s Governing Council; and to tarnish
the reputation of those opposing the illegal war and
occupation.

Saddam Hussein was the President of the sovereign
state of Iraq; a founding member of the United Nations
and the Arab League. He had the full legal authority
to decide which party should benefit from its
relations with Iraq, based on the principle of
reciprocity, whereby political stands are rewarded.
This is exactly what George **** Sr. and Jr. did with
countries that supported their illegal wars and
sanctions, and what every leader in the world does.
It is also wrong to consider those payments as bribes,
since the oil vouchers were not given as gifts, but
those receivers (provided the list is authentic)
received the right to sell Iraqi oil under the MOU and
the income from the sale would have been deposited
into the UN supervised escrow account. In return they
would make a profit. That is a normal business
conduct.

The names of some in the “List” raise questions.

One would understand that awarding vouchers to certain
states or influential parties or organizations would
be logical in order to gain their political support to
the demands for lifting the sanctions. And that would
also suppose that those awarded the vouchers would
have a real influence. But what would Iraq gain from a
group like the 8th of October Movement, which is a
Brazilian Communist group, or Myanmar's Forestry
Minister, or Chad's Foreign Minister? What influence
does any of the above have over the US or inside the
UN to justify the awarding of the vouchers? Wouldn’t
Iraq have better given vouchers to some official in
the Brazilian government than to an obscure communist
group in opposition that has no power nor influence?

These questions, and the denials by a large number of
those named makes one wonder, once again, if the
“List” even exists outside the minds of the Chief
Editor of “Al Mada” and his controllers in Langley..
If the “List” comes from the same sources that
supplied the “45 minute” dossier or the Niger Uranium
documents or the Galloway bribes, then we don’t need
to worry about them. They will end up like the lies
before them and those who invented them in the garbage
bin of history.

Dunno how right it is but it would certainly explain why there isnt more of a fuss being made about this.

[heretic]

Originally posted by Gank

Figured that. Why cant you tell me anything, because its top secret?  Or because you're talking out of your arse?

some of us work jobs where we're required to sign an NDA. Not to mention that yes, my job requires a Secret clearance.

Theres no light, just a list published by one of many Baghdad newspapers with little to back it up. The lack of any evidence supporting the claims from the other end makes them look highly dubious. Paper could be the Baghdad news of the world for all we know.

um.. please read the articles- documents recovered in Iraq's ministries document this, which is why it's being investigated.

[Bobboau]

this is the thing that the UN is investigateing (internaly), corect?

[heretic]

right

[an0n]

I'd also like to point out, since Gank mentioned it, that the News Of The World is a good newspaper.

They generally report crap and anti-immgrant propaganda, but they don't lie and they've got some of the best investigative journalists in the business.

[Gank]

Originally posted by heretic
some of us work jobs where we're required to sign an NDA. Not to mention that yes, my job requires a Secret clearance.

Well as it turns out I'm the President of Ghana and also a CIA operative with top secret clearence so feel free to email the pics to me  Al-mada is a publicly available newspaper, theres no reason for an NDA or secret clearance to apply to it.

Originally posted by heretic
um.. please read the articles- documents recovered in Iraq's ministries document this, which is why it's being investigated.

Umm, the documents were recovered by Al-mada, which refuses to say where exactly they got them. The first people they showed them too were The Daily Telegraph, the exact same newspaper which recovered documents from a Iraqi ministry before implicating the British Labour MP George Galloway of taking bribes off Saddam. These documents turned out to be fakes. So will the Al-mada list. If the allegations were true they would easily be proven, you're talking about billions of barrels of oil here. There'd be a bit more to go on than some documents recovered in a ruined building. How come there was nothing about this in the oil ministry, the only ministry the US saved from destruction?

The whole thing just looks like a big smear campaign, what the hell could Saddam have to gain by bribing the Yugoslav Italian party?