ALLIES 'RESISTED' STOPPING OIL PLOY
Por su interés y relevancia, he seleccionado el artículo que sigue para incluirlo en este sitio web. (L. B.-B.)
El formateado es mío (L. B.-B.)
The governments of
France, Russia, China and Syria blocked U.S. efforts within the United Nations
to stop Saddam Hussein from misusing the oil-for-food program, a State
Department official told Congress yesterday.
Patrick F. Kennedy, a State official who is a representative to the United
Nations for management and reform, told a House hearing that other U.N. member
states "resisted" U.S. efforts to end bribery and contracting corruption under
the program aimed at providing humanitarian relief from anti-Saddam sanctions.
"We began
pushing for a system to bring this under control," Mr. Kennedy said. "It was
resisted by other nations. We were challenged."
Mr. Kennedy told the House Government Reform subcommittee on national
security, emerging threats and international relations that the opponents asked
the United States for hard evidence of corruption.
France, Russia, China and Syria were among the members of a special
committee overseeing the oil-for-food program that opposed U.S. efforts to stop
corruption that led to more than $10 billion being stolen by Saddam and his
regime, Mr. Kennedy said.
Rep. Christopher Shays, Connecticut Republican and subcommittee chairman,
said the oil-for-food program, which lasted from 1996 to 2003, was "mugged" by
Saddam, who diverted some of the revenue to purchase arms.
"Through cynical yet subtle manipulation, he and an undeclared coalition of
the venal on the Security Council exploited structural flaws in the program and
institutional naivete at the U.N. to transform a massive humanitarian aid effort
into a multibillion-dollar, sanctions-busting scam," Mr. Shays said at the
hearing.
Mr. Shays said in an interview later he thinks that Saddam was able to use
money he obtained illicitly from the program "any way he wanted" and that he
probably bought weapons and military technology with some of the $10 billion.
Representatives of three companies involved in the oversight of the
oil-for-food program also testified at the hearing that they had little control
over how funds were used.
Meanwhile, Democrats on the subcommittee sought to widen the panel's probe
to include the United States. Rep. Henry A. Waxman, California Democrat, said an
investigation is needed into the Bush administration's refusal to release audits
of a $1.5 billion contract in Iraq granted to the oil company Halliburton to
repair oil-production facilities after the 2003 U.S.-led invasion.
Vice President Dick Cheney was chief executive officer of Halliburton from
1995 until 2000, and Democrats repeatedly have tried to link the administration
to claims of government favoritism toward the firm.
Mr. Shays said the committee will ask the Defense Department to release the
Halliburton audits, but yesterday's hearing remained focused on charges of
corruption in the United Nations' $64 billion program designed to allow Saddam's
government to buy food and supplies for Iraqi civilians with revenues obtained
from limited oil sales.
"Acceding to shameless
assertions of Iraqi sovereignty, sovereignty already betrayed by Saddam's brutal
willingness to starve the Iraqi people, the U.N. gave the Hussein regime control
over critical aspects of the program," Mr. Shays said.
"Chinese, French and Russian delegates to the Security Council sanctions
committee deftly tabled persistent reports of abuses," the House panel chairman
said, and as a result, "the contractors hired to finance and monitor the program
had only limited authority to enforce safeguards."
"The U.N. sanctions regime against Iraq was all but eviscerated, turned
inside out by political manipulation and financial greed," Mr. Shays said.
"Saddam's regime was not collapsing from within. It was thriving. He was not
safely contained, as some contend, but was daily gaining the means to threaten
regional and global stability again, once sanctions were removed."
Mr. Kennedy defended the oil-for-food program.
"Despite what might in the end be identified as inherent flaws, the
oil-for-food program did enjoy measurable success in meeting the day-to-day
needs of Iraq's civilians," he said.
Other U.S. officials disagreed.
Douglas Feith, the Pentagon's senior policy official, said the oil-for-food
scandal had undermined the United Nations' integrity.
"It's clear that the program
was badly abused," Mr. Feith said in an interview.
The investigation is important because "there are a lot of people, ourselves
included, who want there to be options short of war when there's a problem," Mr.
Feith said.
"And you know, one of the options short of war was a kind of sanctions
regime that the oil-for-food program was supposed to provide," he said. "If it's
a completely corrupt program and it doesn't work and it's ineffective ... then
you have fewer options short of war."
David Smith, a U.S. representative of the French bank BNP Paribas, which was
the exclusive bank of the oil-for-food program, said the bank had no role in the
contracting.