April 30, 2004

U.N. OIL PAPERS VANISH

The vast majority of the United Nations' oil-for-food contracts in Iraq have mysteriously vanished, crippling investigators trying to uncover fraud in the program, a government report charged yesterday.

The General Accounting Office report, presented at a congressional hearing into the scandal-plagued program, determined that 80 percent of U.N. records had not been turned over.

The world body claims it transferred all information it had - including 3,059 contracts worth about $6.2 billion for delivery of food and other civilian goods to the post-Saddam governing body, the Coalition Provisional Authority.

But the GAO report also found that a database the U.N. transferred to the authority was "unreliable because it contained mathematical and currency errors in calculation of contract costs," the report found.

The GAO findings, which were aired at a hearing of the House International Relations Committee, raise new questions about corruption and mismanagement in the biggest-ever U.N. aid program - and what has been called the biggest financial scandal in history. An earlier GAO report said Saddam ripped off over $10 billion.

Committee Chairman Henry Hyde said the report raised serious concerns - and could have "a potential impact on the reputation and credibility of the United Nations."

"If these charges prove true, some of the obvious victims are those Iraqis who failed to receive needed assistance," Hyde (R-Ill.) said.

"But the damage extends further. The massive windfall resulting from this organized theft allowed Saddam to maintain his grip on the country, line his pockets and make companies and countries dance to his tune, with consequences we are still trying to contain."

Hmmm. Would those countries be France, Germany and Russia, inter alia?
I find the uncovering of this scandal almost delightful, revealing the UN for the corrupt band of 3rd world thugs that it mostly is.
(This is the typical Leftist m.o.: "Disappear" the evidence and the crimes never happened, right?)
While I feel true pity for the people of Iraq who truly suffered under Saddam (and the sanctions), it wasn't the United States that is to blame--unless the consensus is that the US should have police power over the UN--but once again, Saddam and the UN, who cared not one whit for anyone but themselves.
I hope that the world community, and in particular the Civilized West, keeps this scandal in the forefront of their minds if they're thinking of levying a similar sanctions program on North Korea and/or Iran.
Nothing short of democratic régime change will serve to bring down a crazy, despotic and nuke-proliferating dictatorship.