CRUDE AWAKENING FOR U.N. SLICKSTERS
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By NILES LATHEM

EXCLUSIVE

WASHINGTON — Iraqi officials have recently implicated more U.N. staffers in bribe taking during the oil-for-food program in a development that could dramatically escalate pressure on the world body, The Post has learned.

Investigators from the House International Relations Committee said several current and former officials in Iraq's Oil, Health and Transportation ministries have told them that U.N. staffers assigned to the "661 Committee" — the U.N. Security Council group that oversaw sanctions and approved oil-for-food contracts — regularly took bribes and kickbacks from suppliers of aid to Iraq during the program.

The Iraqi ministry officials said the U.N. staffers, based in New York, were paid to accelerate approval of oil-for-food contracts or provide secret information on why certain suspicious contracts with Saddam Hussein's regime were blocked by the 661 Committee, investigators said.

News that more U.N. officials may be involved in corruption is the latest revelation to rock the United Nations, where Secretary-General Kofi Annan is fending off calls for his resignation in the aftermath of history's biggest financial scandal in which Saddam is alleged to have ripped off $21.3 billion.

The congressional investigators said they were not given names or told how many of the estimated 100 U.N. staffers assigned to the 661 Committee took payoffs. But they said the House International Relations Committee has expanded its inquiry to investigate these latest allegations.

"We were told this by a lot of mid-level officials in the Iraqi ministries," one congressional investigator said last night. "They learned it from the suppliers. We were told it was very much known throughout the supplier community that this was happening.

"The U.N. people involved were the people who were processing the contracts."

The United States and Britain, who were members of the sanctions committee, put "holds" on billions of dollars' worth of oil-for-food contracts during the program in order to stop Saddam's regime from purchasing military supplies or so-called "dual use" equipment that had both civilian and military purposes.

Information on why a "hold" was put on a contract would be invaluable to the supplier because "it could help them restructure the deals and teach them to hide things better," the congressional investigator added.

So far, the only U.N. official who has been publicly accused of corruption is Benon Sevan, the former head of the oil-for-food program, who has been named in Iraqi Oil Ministry documents as having accepted sweetheart oil deals from Saddam. Sevan has denied the allegations.

Mike Holtzman, spokesman for the U.N.-appointed commission headed by former Federal Reserve Board Chairman Paul Volcker that is investigating the scandal, hinted that more U.N. officials are under investigation.

"We cannot speak to this particular issue," he said. "But this entire investigation is about more than one person. It's about a process that is bigger than one person."

Volcker is due to release a preliminary report on his findings later this month.

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Reply 1 - Posted by: Shucky, 1/8/2005 6:39:11 AM it is poetic justice for the un to be taken down by the Iraqis, who were abandoned to their hellish existence under the monster saddam by the corrupt and inept body of liars and thieves.

Reply 2 - Posted by: pineledger, 1/8/2005 7:03:24 AM You lay down with dogs, you get up with fleas.

Reply 3 - Posted by: mobyclik, 1/8/2005 7:12:17 AM In my opinion, a few minor minnows will go down, but the Big Fish will all swim away...very rich.

Reply 4 - Posted by: Slipknot, 1/8/2005 7:42:53 AM All right now, everybody. In unison! Come-on now, guuuyyys! Everybody get together. An-a-one, a-two, a-one, two three four: GET THE U.N. OUT OF THE U.S. AND THE U.S. OUT OF THE U.N.!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Nice job everybody. The tenor seemed just a tad flat, but we'll work on that after Kofi, Kojo and the boyz are back home ripping off their own people instead of ours.

Reply 5 - Posted by: nevernaught, 1/8/2005 7:50:51 AM Isn't it time for an extended congressional hearing on these charges with UN and Iraqi witnesses. Those UN officials who refuse to testify should be immediately deported. If the UN doesn't cooperate then any and all money we contribute to the UN should cease to be paid until they do. The time for softball is over. Actually the UNs time is over.

Reply 6 - Posted by: NOBS, 1/8/2005 7:57:03 AM So--when such a huge number of rational folks in the US see the UN for what it is, what is the reason we keep feeding the PIG!-?

Reply 7 - Posted by: Duke of Duval, 1/8/2005 9:04:49 AM Send the whole U.N. to some building in Africa. Get them OUT of the US.

Reply 8 - Posted by: romanesq, 1/8/2005 9:05:26 AM How do we get the UN crooks to do a perp walk?

Reply 9 - Posted by: knub, 1/8/2005 10:22:04 AM #4: If you really mean what you say, go to this site: www.getusout.org. I believe that the people of this country were sold a bill of goods(crap) when the UN was proposed and implemented. Wilson tried to get a world government after WWI. I remember when I was a young lad how pitiful Haile Selassie looked when he appealed to the League to stop the Italians who were warring on his country of Ethopia. The League did nothing, just as they did nothing in Rwanda. It hasn't worked and will never work.