UN slams US over spending Iraq funds

[OB Kenobi]

What's this, Bush stealing oil? Say it ain't so...

UN slams US over spending Iraq funds
By Gareth Smyth in Baghdad and Thomas Catan in Washington

United Nations-mandated auditors have sharply criticised the US occupation authority for the way it has spent more than $11bn in Iraqi oil revenues and say they have faced "resistance" from coalition officials.

In an interim report, obtained by the Financial Times, KPMG says the Development Fund for Iraq, which is managed by the US-led Coalition Provisional Authority and channels oil revenue into reconstruction projects, is "open to fraudulent acts".

The auditors criticise the CPA's bookkeeping and warn: "The CPA does not have effective controls over the ministries' spending of their individually allocated budgets, whether the funds are direct from the CPA or via the ministry of finance."

The findings come after US complaints about the UN's administration of the oil-for-food programme under Saddam Hussein.

According to the CPA, the Development Fund for Iraq has taken in $20.2bn since last May and has disbursed $11.3bn, with $4.6bn left in outstanding commitments.

One adviser to a member of the recently disbanded Iraqi Governing Council said the report raised the fear that no audit of the CPA's work would ever be completed. "If the auditors don't finish by June 30, they never will, because the CPA staff are going home," he said. "I lament the lack of transparency and lack of involvement by Iraqis."

The KPMG auditors are answerable to the International Advisory and Monitoring Board, set up by the UN Security Council in May last year to oversee coalition spending from the development fund. The account contains oil revenues, frozen assets and money left over from the UN's oil-for-food programme.

The watchdog comprises representatives of the World Bank, International Monetary Fund and Arab Fund for Social and Economic Development. It spent much of last year battling with occupation administrators over the watchdog's remit. Officials said they were able to begin working in earnest only in April.

In their first interim report, KPMG said it had "encountered resistance from CPA staff". CPA staff told KPMG they were overworked and had given them a "low priority".

The UN decided this month that responsibility for the Development Fund for Iraq will pass to the Iraqi interim government and be monitored by the the IAMB. The panel also intends to widen its scrutiny of past CPA spending by examining reports and audits by the Pentagon's inspector general and the General Accounting Office, an official said.

IAMB officials were meeting in Paris on Monday and were not available for comment.

Some of KPMG's most damning criticisms were of the State Organisation for Marketing Oil, responsible for the sale of Iraq's most crucial asset. Oil sales, which go into the US-controlled fund, have topped $10bn since the overthrow of Saddam Hussein.

Somo's only record of barter transactions was "an independent database, derived from verbal confirmations gained by Somo staff", the report found.

The CPA declined to address the KPMG report, saying only that it "has been and will continue to discharge its responsibilities under the Iraqi Development Fund".

One Iraqi minister due to take office on June 30 told the FT he and many colleagues felt "let down by how the CPA has controlled resources".

http://news.ft.com/servlet/ContentServer?pagename=FT.com/StoryFT/FullStory&c=StoryFT&cid=1087373157793&p=1012571727085

[Argyll]

Interesting..............perhaps the UN will shell out from it's own pockets in the furure?

When a pipeline in Iraq is blown,they lose something in the region of $30 million dollars a day in production.
So going around blowing these lines up is only hurting the Iraqi's themselves.

OB kenobi.......your postings have very very familiar undertones to them,I'm willing to bet you've already been banned from this site under another name.....if this is so,then you'll be history.

[seruriermarshal]

Interesting..............perhaps the UN will shell out from it's own pockets in the furure?

When a pipeline in Iraq is blown,they lose something in the region of $30 million dollars a day in production.
So going around blowing these lines up is only hurting the Iraqi's themselves.

OB kenobi.......your postings have very very familiar undertones to them,I'm willing to bet you've already been banned from this site under another name.....if this is so,then you'll be history.

You are right Argyll !

BTW

I hope you safe in Iraq , there so danger .

[budanski]

The United Nations has been caught perpertrating what is being called the most high-dollar, destructive, inhumane scandal in history, the Oil-For-Food scandal. Looks like they're starting to build their defense: Throw mud on the United States.

Why in the world is America using Iraqi oil money for Iraq's reconstruction?

The proper UN model suggests Iraqi oil money should be funnelled to private accounts of the well connected!

[He219]

"open to fraudulent acts".
the irony ...

[ibstolidude]

I must have missed tha part about Bush stealing oil, or anyone stealing oil or actually ANYONE stealing ANYTHING; I thought that they described that the potential exists due to a lack of control; as opposed to say the UN's former Iraqi oil programs...

[2Sheds_Jackson]

Kenobi is adding 2 + 2 and getting 5...which interestingly is what he's accused Bush of doing over Iraq. rofl

Gee, somebody at the UN is unhappy about transparency in Iraq huh? Better get a security council resolution. Better insist on inspections! Institute a no-fly zone!

But then again, the UN just finished proving to the world that it has no power, no will to enforce its' own mandates...so the US has nothing to worry about. They've become the Rodney Dangerfield of international politics. This is beyond funny.

[Supes]

The United Nations has been caught perpertrating what is being called the most high-dollar, destructive, inhumane scandal in history, the Oil-For-Food scandal. Looks like they're starting to build their defense: Throw mud on the United States.

Why in the world is America using Iraqi oil money for Iraq's reconstruction?

The proper UN model suggests Iraqi oil money should be funnelled to private accounts of the well connected!

I have heard a lot of about this scandal but i don't know much in detail and other facts about the whole thing. Could anyone explain to me about it? Isn't Koffi Annan part of this scandal also? Thanks

[OB Kenobi]

Interesting..............perhaps the UN will shell out from it's own pockets in the furure?

When a pipeline in Iraq is blown,they lose something in the region of $30 million dollars a day in production.
So going around blowing these lines up is only hurting the Iraqi's themselves.

The article I posted from the Financial Times did not suggest that they should. It said that the CPA has been using proceeds from Iraqi oil sales without any oversight and *for its own purposes* rather than for strictly the reconstruction of Iraq under the control of the Iraqi people and government.

As the article stated--I say this because you are suggesting that it is just my "clueless" opinion--the Iraqis themselves, not just the UN want know what has been happening with the proceeds from their oil sales.



OB kenobi.......your postings have very very familiar undertones to them,I'm willing to bet you've already been banned from this site under another name.....if this is so,then you'll be history.

No, I have never been here before under another name. If you think I am suggesting that this war was strictly over oil, that is not what I mean, and I know how much more complicated the reasons are. But, what I do think is that Bush has mishandled the war, and misrepresented the reasons for why it was started.

So far we've lost half a trillion $$$ this year, and it will continue. What exactly is the payoff? Terrorism has not decreased, and has actually increased. The success of the Iraq occupation at the very least is "questionable." It is for these reasons and others that I feel the policies of the Bush administration should be questioned.

[OB Kenobi]

U.S. Manages Iraqi Oil Money Sloppily - UN Watchdog
By Irwin Arieff

UNITED NATIONS (*******) - The U.S.-led occupation is sloppily managing billions of dollars of Iraqi oil money and moving at a glacial pace to guard against corruption, an international watchdog agency charged on Tuesday.

The Coalition Provisional Authority has yet to award contracts for equipment to meter Iraq's oil production, leaving a door open to smuggling, despite earlier saying it had awarded the contracts, the International Advisory and Monitoring Board said.

The U.S.-led administration also has delayed completing audits of the State Oil Marketing Organization, the state-owned firm that markets Iraqi oil, the U.N.-mandated agency said.

In addition, authorities in Baghdad have put off for three months a request by the board that it turn over U.S. audits of sole-source contracts funded with Iraqi oil money and awarded to Halliburton last year without competitive bidding, the watchdog agency said.

Halliburton, the Texas oil services firm once headed by Vice President **** Cheney, has been accused by some Democrats of war profiteering after winning billions of dollars in sole-source contracts from the U.S. military in Iraq.

The U.S. audits of the Halliburton contracts paid with Iraqi oil money, initially requested in March, had not yet been handed over despite repeated requests, the board said.

As a result, the board said it was ordering its own audit "to determine the extent of the sole-sourced contracts."

AUDIT DUE AFTER SHUTDOWN

The U.N. Security Council set up the monitoring board in May 2003 to ensure the U.S.-led civil administration was not engaged in dubious practices in marketing Iraqi oil and was using the money for reconstruction.

The board issued its criticism after a two-day meeting in Paris and just days before the Coalition Provisional Authority is due to shut down after handing power to an interim Iraqi government on June 30.

Under a May 2003 council resolution, all the proceeds of Iraqi oil and gas exports are deposited into a special account called the Development Fund for Iraq.

Accounting giant KPMG is auditing the fund, but its initial audit -- covering the first six months -- will not be ready until July 14, two weeks after the June 30 shutdown of the occupation authority, the board said.
A KPMG interim report, presented to the board in Paris, said occupation authorities had left the fund vulnerable to fraud and said coalition officials had resisted cooperating with the auditors, the Financial Times reported on Tuesday.

Since the war, $10.8 billion in Iraqi oil money has been deposited in the development fund, more than half of total deposits of $20.2 billion for the period.

The rest comes from sources including leftover funds from the now-defunct U.N. oil-for-food program and Iraqi overseas deposits dating back to the Saddam Hussein regime.

The occupation has spent $11.2 billion from the fund, primarily for development projects and ministry budgets.

Another $4.6 billion has been committed but not yet spent, leaving $4.4 billion, according to the latest Coalition Provisional Authority figures.

After June 30, the interim government will resume full control of Iraqi oil resources under a Security Council resolution adopted this month.

The resolution requires Iraq to continue depositing oil revenues into the fund, which the monitoring board will continue to oversee.

http://www.*******.com/newsArticle.jhtml;jsessionid=02CGW130NDQRCCRBAEKSFFA?type=worldNews&storyID=5487706&pageNumber=1

[Supes]

I don't think it really matters whether or not the CPA or US spend this money anyway. The US has spent 10s of billions of dollars on Iraq of it's own money already.

[usa320]

rofl

THe UN is in no poisition to be lecturing anyone over the spending of Iraq funds....

rofl

[SOG]

again the wonderfull tactic of "accuse your oppenent of the same thing, only do it louder."

meanwhile im sure the UN is enjoying its healthy probing in the food for oil scandal as to where certain money went -


Proceeds from such oil sales are banked in New York (French bank, BNP Paribas and 41% of the money passed through J.P. Morgan Chase Bank)…. Thirty-four percent is skimmed off for disbursement to outside parties with claims on Iraq, such as the Kuwaitis, as well as to meet the costs of the UN effort in Iraq. A further thirteen percent goes to meet the needs of the Kurdish autonomous area in the north.

UN - fully supported and kept in place food for oil in 96 which was supported by the US and killed:

1996 Madeleine Albright, who was then the U.S. ambassador to the UN, was asked by 60 Minutes correspondent Lesley Stahl, in reference to years of U.S.-led economic sanctions against Iraq,
We have heard that half a million children have died. I mean, that is more children than died in Hiroshima. And, you know, is the price worth it?
To which Ambassador Albright responded, I think that is a very hard choice, but the price, we think, the price is worth it.
The following January Albright was confirmed by the U.S. Senate as President Clinton’s secretary of state. In her opening statement to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, which was considering her appointment, she said, We will insist on maintaining tough U.N. sanctions against Iraq unless and until that regime complies with relevant Security Council resolutions.

food for oil, half mil children dead, conservative estimate is 200,000 and over a million total iraqi's dead in non war sanctions. you know, the sanctions claiming WMD as a mandatory sanction. you know, the hundreds of tons of WMD. unnacounted for proceeds, blah blah blah.

yell louder, they may not recognize the UN's probing, murder, money mishandling, unfair sanctions.

baaa baaaa scape goat.

[Jack Mehoff]

UN bitch because we spend Iraq's oil for their own reconstruction? :|

[budanski]

I have heard a lot of about this scandal but i don't know much in detail and other facts about the whole thing. Could anyone explain to me about it? Isn't Koffi Annan part of this scandal also? Thanks

The Great Cash Cow (http://www.nytimes.com/2004/06/23/opinion/23SAFI.html)

Kojo & Kofi
Unbelievable U.N. stories. (http://www.nationalreview.com/comment/rosett200403101819.asp)

The Oil-for-Food Scandal
The program was corrupt. The U.N. owes the Iraqis--and Congress--an explanation. (http://www.opinionjournal.com/editorial/feature.html?id=110004801)

UN caves in on inquiry into its Iraq oil-for-food 'scandal' (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml;$sessionid$YXTWLRA1H1B4VQFIQMFCFGGAVCBQYIV0?xml=/news/2004/03/14/wiraq14.xml&sSheet=/portal/2004/03/14/ixportaltop.html)

Monumental Rip-Off?
Allegations of Widespread Corruption Involve Saddam Hussein, U.N. Senior Officials (http://abcnews.go.com/sections/WNT/Investigation/oil_for_food_ripoff_040420-1.html)

Saddam’s Gifts
Document: Saddam Supporters Received Lucrative Oil Contracts (http://abcnews.go.com/sections/WNT/Investigation/saddam_oil_vouchers_040129.html)

Iraqi Paper Lists Companies And Organizations Hussein Allegedly Bribed With Oil (http://www.rferl.org/features/features_article.aspx?id=02d77757-23a6-4adc-8139-2df8efaf9251&y=2004&m=01)

Turtle Bay’s Carnival of Corruption
Digging deeper into the scandalous Oil-for-Food program.
(http://www.nationalreview.com/comment/rosett200403212155.asp)

[OB Kenobi]

I'm all for catching any crooks that might be infesting the UN, that would be a good thing. But that's no excuse for spending Iraq's oil proceeds as if they were your own.

Too many people forget that this is supposed to be a "liberation." Not my claim, Bush's claim. According to the plan, America is supposed to show the world that it has good intentions for Iraq, how beneficial Democracy is, that Christians don't want to eliminate Islam, etc. You screw this up and you'll have no one to blame but yourselves. Won't be any more excuses this time.

[usa320]

Its not like were spending the money on American colleges and hospitals...

The money is all going to in some way, shape or form, benefit the Iraqi people.