11-28-2005, 06:17 AM
<b>Volcker deals the blow, friends in solidarity show</b>
RAVINDRA KUMAR
It is easy to see why the Congress has decided to rally round in support of External Affairs Minister K Natwar Singh, after he was named as a non-contractual beneficiary by an independent inquiry report commissioned by the United Nations on Iraqâs oil-for-food programme under Saddam Hussein. The party has no option; it has itself been named as a non-contractual beneficiary.
It is just as easy to see why the Communists are so supportive of a minister they accused not so long ago of selling out national interests. Scrutiny of the report shows that among the non-contractual beneficiaries of the programme are such fraternal cousins of our comrades as the Communist parties of Belarus, Romania, Russia, Slovakia and Ukraine, and the Socialist parties of Bulgaria, Yugoslavia and Ukraine.
Also named is that darling of Western communists, George Galloway, a man whose election to the House of Commons was secured on the basis of Asian (Bangladeshi, Pakistani and Indian) votes mobilised by Left sympathisers.
The documentation is detailed, and the list of beneficiaries reads like a Whoâs Who of international politics and business. It includes such luminaries as Megawati Soekarnoputri of Indonesia, Abdullah Badawi of Malaysia, Vladimir Zhirinovsky of Russia, French politician Charles Pasqua, <b>the president of Lombardy in Italy, Roberto Formigoni,</b><i>(Note from the poster:Friend of Sonia Manio)</i> the son of the Lebanese president and the children of the Congolese president among others. The Government of Pakistan is listed as a non-contractual beneficiary, so are the Palestine National Front and our own Reliance Petroleum.
The governmentâs response to the disclosures has not been very convincing. To suggest, as a Left-friendly news channel attempted to do, that back-channel diplomacy would be resorted to in a bid to uncover the facts is disingenuous. The Volcker report is based on records collected from Saddam Husseinâs State Oil Marketing Organisation and the Ministry of Oil. The committee does not claim to have created the documents; it has collated them.
For the Congress to threaten to send legal notices to the United Nations and members of the committee is frankly infantile; somehow the chances of Kofi Annan and Paul Volcker losing sleep over the prospect of appearing in the Patiala House courts to answer charges of defamation seem remote. Other countries and political entities caught unawares by this whirlwind are at least attempting serious inquiry. The Congress-Left combine appears to be flat-footed, and except for blanket condemnation of the report as an American plot to discredit those who opposed Washingtonâs Iraq misadventure, has not offered a viable defence.
Even the threat of legal action against the United Nations is ill-conceived. The Independent Inquiry Committee headed by Mr Volcker is not a part of the United Nations, or a UN office. The committee was appointed by Secretary-General Kofi Annan as an independent body to investigate allegations of corruption in the Oil-for-Food programme. The UN Security Council (through resolution 1538/2004) unanimously welcomed the appointment of the Committee and called on the Coalition Authority in Iraq and all member states to cooperate fully with the inquiry.
There are specific aspects of the disclosures that need probe. As a major political party has been named as a beneficiary, the least we ought to expect is that its president, Mrs Sonia Gandhi, offer to open up financial records for scrutiny. After all, if wrongdoing is established, it is the partyâs president and treasurer at the time who must have been responsible.
Mr Natwar Singh is shown as a non-contractual beneficiary in an allotment of two million barrels of oil to a privately owned oil company, Masefield AG, with headquarters in Zug, Switzerland. It should be possible to establish if there is indeed a link between the company and either Mr Singh or members of his family.
The other aspect that needs to be considered by the Congress before it gets all hot and bothered is to consider the sources of information cited in the UN report, especially with regard to the tables listing the various beneficiaries.
According to the report, the information is based on (a) documents and records maintained by the United Nations, specifically the Office for Iraq Programme; (b) Records of the Government of Iraq, including ledgers of oil surcharge payments, lists of allocation, letters from SOMO to the Ministry of Oil, and records from Iraqi embassies in various countries; © Records from various financial institutions, and (d) Records provided by various entities involved in the purchase of oil from Iraq.
Non-contractual payments, where the Congress party and Mr Singh feature, are covered in Table 3 of the report. These beneficiaries are described as parties that did not execute contracts for oil, but sold the rights to others. The information contained in Table 3 is based on records of the Iraqi Ministry of Oil.
Available facts can be studied quite easily. They have been put on the inquiry committeeâs website âhttp://www.iic-offp.org â and are accessible. Responses to these revelations must be measured, not hysterical. After all, it wasnât so long ago that another source â the Mitrokhin archives â told us just how grubby our politicians are. This newspaper had cautioned then that man-eaters donât easily turn vegetarian. We owe it to ourselves to get to the bottom of this matter.
RAVINDRA KUMAR
It is easy to see why the Congress has decided to rally round in support of External Affairs Minister K Natwar Singh, after he was named as a non-contractual beneficiary by an independent inquiry report commissioned by the United Nations on Iraqâs oil-for-food programme under Saddam Hussein. The party has no option; it has itself been named as a non-contractual beneficiary.
It is just as easy to see why the Communists are so supportive of a minister they accused not so long ago of selling out national interests. Scrutiny of the report shows that among the non-contractual beneficiaries of the programme are such fraternal cousins of our comrades as the Communist parties of Belarus, Romania, Russia, Slovakia and Ukraine, and the Socialist parties of Bulgaria, Yugoslavia and Ukraine.
Also named is that darling of Western communists, George Galloway, a man whose election to the House of Commons was secured on the basis of Asian (Bangladeshi, Pakistani and Indian) votes mobilised by Left sympathisers.
The documentation is detailed, and the list of beneficiaries reads like a Whoâs Who of international politics and business. It includes such luminaries as Megawati Soekarnoputri of Indonesia, Abdullah Badawi of Malaysia, Vladimir Zhirinovsky of Russia, French politician Charles Pasqua, <b>the president of Lombardy in Italy, Roberto Formigoni,</b><i>(Note from the poster:Friend of Sonia Manio)</i> the son of the Lebanese president and the children of the Congolese president among others. The Government of Pakistan is listed as a non-contractual beneficiary, so are the Palestine National Front and our own Reliance Petroleum.
The governmentâs response to the disclosures has not been very convincing. To suggest, as a Left-friendly news channel attempted to do, that back-channel diplomacy would be resorted to in a bid to uncover the facts is disingenuous. The Volcker report is based on records collected from Saddam Husseinâs State Oil Marketing Organisation and the Ministry of Oil. The committee does not claim to have created the documents; it has collated them.
For the Congress to threaten to send legal notices to the United Nations and members of the committee is frankly infantile; somehow the chances of Kofi Annan and Paul Volcker losing sleep over the prospect of appearing in the Patiala House courts to answer charges of defamation seem remote. Other countries and political entities caught unawares by this whirlwind are at least attempting serious inquiry. The Congress-Left combine appears to be flat-footed, and except for blanket condemnation of the report as an American plot to discredit those who opposed Washingtonâs Iraq misadventure, has not offered a viable defence.
Even the threat of legal action against the United Nations is ill-conceived. The Independent Inquiry Committee headed by Mr Volcker is not a part of the United Nations, or a UN office. The committee was appointed by Secretary-General Kofi Annan as an independent body to investigate allegations of corruption in the Oil-for-Food programme. The UN Security Council (through resolution 1538/2004) unanimously welcomed the appointment of the Committee and called on the Coalition Authority in Iraq and all member states to cooperate fully with the inquiry.
There are specific aspects of the disclosures that need probe. As a major political party has been named as a beneficiary, the least we ought to expect is that its president, Mrs Sonia Gandhi, offer to open up financial records for scrutiny. After all, if wrongdoing is established, it is the partyâs president and treasurer at the time who must have been responsible.
Mr Natwar Singh is shown as a non-contractual beneficiary in an allotment of two million barrels of oil to a privately owned oil company, Masefield AG, with headquarters in Zug, Switzerland. It should be possible to establish if there is indeed a link between the company and either Mr Singh or members of his family.
The other aspect that needs to be considered by the Congress before it gets all hot and bothered is to consider the sources of information cited in the UN report, especially with regard to the tables listing the various beneficiaries.
According to the report, the information is based on (a) documents and records maintained by the United Nations, specifically the Office for Iraq Programme; (b) Records of the Government of Iraq, including ledgers of oil surcharge payments, lists of allocation, letters from SOMO to the Ministry of Oil, and records from Iraqi embassies in various countries; © Records from various financial institutions, and (d) Records provided by various entities involved in the purchase of oil from Iraq.
Non-contractual payments, where the Congress party and Mr Singh feature, are covered in Table 3 of the report. These beneficiaries are described as parties that did not execute contracts for oil, but sold the rights to others. The information contained in Table 3 is based on records of the Iraqi Ministry of Oil.
Available facts can be studied quite easily. They have been put on the inquiry committeeâs website âhttp://www.iic-offp.org â and are accessible. Responses to these revelations must be measured, not hysterical. After all, it wasnât so long ago that another source â the Mitrokhin archives â told us just how grubby our politicians are. This newspaper had cautioned then that man-eaters donât easily turn vegetarian. We owe it to ourselves to get to the bottom of this matter.