Volcker & Bofors - Congress Party involvement

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<b>Natwar not yet out of oil-for-food scam </b>: Times of Islamabad<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->NEW DELHI: Panthers Party chief Bhim Singh has confirmed that he was offered a lucrative deal by the Saddam Hussein regime under the Oil-for-Food Programme (OFFP), but says he declined it. Even more significantly, Singh also told TOI he had seen a document that suggested external affairs minister Natwar Singh was among several others who were offered similar money-spinning oil allocations.

Bhim Singh claims the offers were made by a committee headed by the then deputy prime minister of Iraq, Tariq Aziz and the then vice-president, Taha Yassin Ramadan.

The revelations are the first instance of a person "accused" by the UN report confirming that lucrative deals were indeed offered by the Saddam regime. They are likely to add pressure on the beleaguered Natwar Singh, who has attempted to rubbish the UN panel’s report.

Bhim Singh said he had written to UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan on Wednesday, demanding that the UN should not only publicly provide details of evidence against those who accepted such sweetheart deals, but also the evidence that some —like him — refused all such offers.............. <!--emo&:guitar--><img src='style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/guitar.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='guitar.gif' /><!--endemo--> <!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->