Oil-For-Food Chief Accused of Kickbacks
Charles Johnson
Mon Aug 8, 2005 at 10:22 am PDT • Views: 150
Former chief of the Oil-For-Food program Benon Sevan will be the first UN fall guy: Oil-For-Food Chief Accused of Kickbacks. (Hat tip: zulubaby.)
NEW YORK - Investigators probing claims of wrongdoing in the Iraq oil-for-food program accused its former chief, Benon Sevan, of corruption for taking illegal kickbacks and recommended his immunity be lifted for prosecution.
The investigators said a former U.N. procurement officer sought a bribe and should have his immunity lifted as well. Alexander Yakovlev also was accused of collecting nearly $1 million in kickbacks outside the oil-for-food program.
The third report by the Independent Inquiry Committee, led by former Federal Reserve Chairman Paul Volcker, was a new blow to the scandal-tainted $64 billion program. For the first time, it gave a motive for Sevan’s actions, saying his finances were “precarious” shortly before his alleged misdeeds.
Some critics have accused the United Nations of squandering millions — and even billions — of dollars in its mismanagement of the program. Yet Volcker’s team found that Sevan appeared to have received kickbacks of just $147,184 from December 1998 to January 2002.
The report touched briefly on U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan and his son, Kojo. It said new e-mails suggesting Annan knew more than he said about his son’s involvement in the program raised questions that would be answered in the committee’s final report, expected in September.
Frank says: