From the UKs Guardian: http://tinyurl.com/c2cht
A report released last night by Democratic staff on a Senate investigations committee presents documentary evidence that the Bush administration was made aware of illegal oil sales and kickbacks paid to the Saddam Hussein regime but did nothing to stop them.
Oh the hypocrisy.
Update [2005-5-16 20:52:27 by observer393]: And now there is the story of the US using Galloway’s middleman to trade oil. From the Independent: http://tinyurl.com/bz7fl
Fawaz Zureikat was speaking publicly for the first time since he was named by a US Senate investigative committee examining the United Nations oil-for-food programme. He told The Independent that neither the new government in Baghdad nor US officials had raised any objections to him renewing his trade with Iraq.
and on what threatens to be an interesting day George seems to be a combative mood:
“If I had I would be a very rich man and the person who made me rich would already be in the public domain,” he said.
“I am going to accuse them of being involved in a huge diversion from the real issues in Iraq, which are the theft of billions of dollars worth of Iraq’s wealth by the United States of America and its corporations, and the deaths of more than 100,000 people in Iraq.”
According to the confidential report prepared by professor Giuseppe Cassano (dean of economic statistics at the University of Teramo) for the Ministry of Productive Activity in February 2003 and discussed here, the United States was the number one consumer of Iraqi oil in the fiscal year 2001 despite the embargo.
So much for Oil for Food.
The report advised the Italian government to jump on the pork barrel for a fast cut of the booty.
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You can drop the “quote” marks, put a clear question forward to Bill or Madeleine on this issue. Throughout the nineties, the US allowed uncontrolled oil shipments by tanker truck convoys east to Jordan and north to Turkey for economic support of US allies, who suffered heavily due to the UN embargo. This was as overt an operation as can be. The US was monitoring every movement over land in the two “no-fly” zones and were patrolling and intercepting ships in the Red Sea and the Persian Gulf.
The oil smuggling by sea was coordinated in Dubai [UAE], by the experts who for centuries have made a living from contra-band smuggling. The US themselves undercut the UN weapon embargo to former Yugoslavian states in the nineties, by coordinating through Turkey, Iran and Saudi Arabia weapons and arms shipment to the Bosnian Muslims. Try Google for the “Croatian pipeline”. This policy helped to place an Al-Qaeda cel with a strong foothold in the region, the remnants are still in place, even after an attempt to dismantle it after 9/11.
The US government knows the true policy and facts, so do the regional allies and the Arabian people involved. So why the charade, just for domestic consumption? I am anxious to see whether in the hearings, Galloway is allowed time to make his own statement, or gets censored by the committee chairman.
Oui – Liberté – Egalité – Fraternité
while not wanting to disturb the thread, there appears to be a connection between DeLay, Bayoil and Mikael Khodorkovsky/Yukos.
Yukos filed for bankruptcy protection in Texas courts.
Khodorkovsky picked up part of tab for DeLay junket to Russia.
And follow the trail from Bruce Rappaport, Bank of New York and Russian Mafia via small Caribbean corporations to Bayoil.
Follow the money
I have driven the road between Amman, Jordan and Baghdad a couple of times in the late 90s and saw this with my own eyes. Tanker trucks literally bumper-to-bumper throughout long stretches of the road (the old road running parallel to the fairly new highway). Saw the same up north towards Turkey, though it seemed to be of a lesser extent.
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A close friend worked and lived in the region during the nineties, I could write a best seller on the facts and his experiences with the Arabs and lack of Justice in young nations of tribal origin.
I’m afraid the publisher would run the book as fiction instead, life’s real experiences are hard to belief.
Oui – Liberté – Egalité – Fraternité
AP has picked up on it.
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The Jordanian oil purchases were shipped in the weeks before the war, out of the Iraqi port of Khor al-Amaya, which was operating without UN approval or surveillance.
Investigators found correspondence showing that Odin Marine Inc, the US company chartering the seven huge tankers which picked up the oil at Khor al-Amaya, repeatedly sought and received approval from US military and civilian officials. The ships would not be confiscated by US Navy vessels in the Maritime Interdiction Force (MIF), enforcing the embargo. Odin was reassured by a state department official, that the US was aware of the shipments and has determined not to take action.
The company’s vice president, David Young, told investigators that a US naval officer at MIF told him that he “had no objections” to the shipments. “He said that he was sorry he could not say anything more. I told him I completely understood and did not expect him to say anything more,” Mr Young said. An executive at Odin Maritime confirmed the senate account of the oil shipments as “correct” but declined to comment further.
Oui – Liberté – Egalité – Fraternité
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Complete list of contracts awarded by USAID and PCO – Nov. 2004
Oui – Liberté – Egalité – Fraternité
“But let’s be fair. Helping Saddam kill people with chemical gas was not the only reason why Reagan and Bush I aided their favorite dictator. They had bigger fish to fry — using the Constitution as kindling for the feast.”
LINK: http://forum.atimes.com/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=1269
“Of course, the fact that three U.S. presidents — the two George Bushes and their new best pal, Bill Clinton — actually brokered massive backroom oil deals for Saddam that dwarfed Bayoil’s petty chiseling, plus the fact that Saddam’s nation-strangling thievery has since been eclipsed by the epic rapine of Bush II’s Babylonian Conquest, in no way mitigates the seriousness of the Chalmers indictment. But somehow we doubt you’ll be seeing those august statesmen sharing leg irons with old Davy anytime soon.”