Iraq Debate Part II

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#1 Eli Van Brunt on 03.12.08 at 5:05 pm

Justin,
I’m not sure how familiar you are with the UN’s Oil-For-Food program. I think it is a very key thing to consider with regards to UN “permission” in invade Iraq.

Here is a research essay I wrote about Oil-For-Food. I hope you find it interesting. . .

March 20, 2006

Institutionalized Conspiracy

How was a program that was implemented for humanitarian relief allowed to become an institutionalized conspiracy? The answer is complex, but the faults were not unavoidable. The Oil-For-Food program has been a hot topic in the international spotlight, specifically with regards to the UN’s integrity, since before the fall of Saddam Hussein. Saddam Hussein turned a relief program into one of the largest global conspiracies of all time; all the while the international community did little to stop him.
The program was originally proposed by Secretary-General Javier Perez de Cuellar with the idea of letting Iraq sell limited amounts of oil strictly in exchange for humanitarian supplies. This proposal was initially rejected by Saddam, but later in the 1990’s he accepted the program. Months were spent negotiating the implementation of the program. Saddam blamed the United States for the suffering of Iraqi civilians, and soon after, an easily exploitable Oil-For-Food was passed. However, Saddam made this claim knowing full well that the sanctions imposed on Iraq did not forbid food or medicine from coming into the country. The reason this wasn’t happening was because Saddam would order attacks on those who tried to parachute in supplies. Hence providing food and medicine to Iraqi’s could not be done without the cooperation of Saddam (Graham-Brown).
From the start the program gave Saddam the right to: (1) negotiate his own contracts for selling Iraqi oil, (2) choose his own foreign customers, (3) make up his own list of humanitarian supplies, and (4) orchestrate the distribution of relief supplies. On top of this, he was allowed to choose the bank that would mainly handle the funds and issue the letters of credit to his suppliers; a French bank called BNP Paribas was chosen. These rights were to be overseen by the UN, which could at any point reject Saddam’s plans. Also the UN was to control the program’s bank accounts, and make sure Saddam’s buying and selling followed the UN’s proposed humanitarian plan as instituted by Resolution 986. Under the Oil-For-Food Resolution 986, oil was to be sold at a “fair market value,” and the revenue was intended to go strictly toward goods and services “for equitable distribution of humanitarian relief to all segments of the Iraqi population throughout the country” (Rosett.).
When Sevan was appointed to manage various aspects of the program by Kofi Annan, Sevan took a series of steps to expand the program. For example the cap on how much oil Saddam could trade in any given year went from $4 billion to $10 billion, followed by no limit. Aside from budgetary expansion, the program was expanded to include oil-industry equipment. Sevan also took actions that resulted in Saddam’s dealings to become confidential. This greatly limited the power of the US and UK to make sure Saddam did not acquire things not designated for humanitarian relief. After Sevan took these actions, things Saddam received from his customers, were recorded in an extremely non-descriptive manner. The price paid was kept confidential, as well as the specific buyer and the purpose of the item purchased. A typical level of description would be: “electric motor” from France (Ibid.).
During the program, Saddam also kicked out weapons inspectors, forbidding them to return. This issue was not pushed until later when George W. Bush gave Saddam an ultimatum to comply with 16 previous UN resolutions to disarm or suffer the consequences (Ibid.).
Near the end of the program, it had reached a new level. Secretary-General Annan approved Saddam’s new shopping list, which included “labor and social affairs,” “justice,” “information,” and “sports.” As pointed out by Claudia Rosett:
Either the Secretary-General had failed to notice or he did not care that none of these had anything to do with the equitable distribution of relief. By contrast, they had everything to do with the running of Saddam’s totalitarian state. “Labor,” “information,” and “justice” were the realms of Baathist party patronage, propaganda, censorship, secret police, rape rooms, and mass graves. As for sports, that was the favorite arena of Saddam’s sadistic son Uday, already infamous for torturing Iraqi athletes. (Rosett)

In the end Oil-For-Food grossed a total of around $65 billion. Of this $65 billion, Annan claims $46 billion went toward humanitarian supplies; however, an official $15 billion went to providing food and health supplies before Saddam’s fall. A list of those who received oil vouchers was published by the newspaper Al-Mada, consisting of 270 individuals or entities in 50 countries. One individual named Ahmed Idris Nasreddin is on America’s list of people “belonging to or associated with” al Qaeda. Another individual sited on this list was a member of the Secretariat, Bennon Sevan (Ibid.).
Some countries were focusing on unrelated agendas, while others were working with Saddam to systematically mold Oil-For-Food to their advantage. One argument is that the US and UK actually supported the program from the beginning to implement their supposed agenda – regime change – and that the program was never really a humanitarian effort. If regime change really were Oil-For-Food’s purpose, then it horribly failed. The program actually helped to strengthen Saddam’s regime (Ritter). For instance, with kickback funds he was able to increase Iraq’s military budget by over 4000% (Testani).
It was well known by the international community by 2002 that Saddam had developed a rather simple way to make profit off the program. He would sell oil to his select customers, mainly France and Russia, for under-market value. After that, Saddam’s customers would then resell the oil at standard prices, making a huge profit. They would then kick back to Saddam his share of the profit as a “surcharge”. These “surcharges” were deposited to bank accounts unrelated to from Oil-for-Food (in blatant violation of the UN’s sanctions) (Rosett).
As the al-Mada in Iraq reports, 270 people and organizations had received contracts to do business with Saddam through Oil-For-Food. As Testani explains:
It included one member of the Russian presidential office and several Frenchmen like former Interior Minister Charles Pasqua who had
financial and other influence over President Jacques Chirac and could serve as conduits to him for Saddam. Iraq’s own foreign minister now openly admits that “oil bribes to foreign officials and businesses were ’standard practices’ under Saddam Hussein’s regime.” Shortly after al-Mada’s exposé, the US General Accounting Office – responsible for finalizing oil-for-food-related contracts and tracking down fortunes of old regime members – found that Saddam made $5.7 billion from oil smuggling and $4.4 billion from charges on suppliers. What’s more, of over 750 contracts granted through oil-for-food, “nearly half had been overpriced, by an average of 21%.” These trends are indicative that UN has become a “place for deals, political leverage, bribery, graft, and fraud.”(Testani)

Why the US and UK would want Saddam making money off the program is rather perplexing if the point of Oil-For-Food was regime change (Ibid.).
Another, perhaps more common counter argument offered is that the program, for the most part, did provide humanitarian relief. Also some argue that it was not the job of the Secretariat to make sure Saddam did not break UN sanctions, although he did continuously in plain view of those monitoring him. These two arguments seem to want to eliminate accountability of the Secretariat completely. It is unwise to conclude that UN officials running a UN program are not accountable for reporting violations. This is exactly how Kofi Annan justified himself when confronted with charges of conspiracy and corruption (UN News Centre). A high-ranking UN official taking such a stance is irresponsible. It may not have been his job to enforce sanctions, but it seems reasonable to expect that he would report violations. As far as providing humanitarian relief the question can be raised, why, “given . . . the world’s largest humanitarian program ever, can there remain shortages of basic medicines and foodstuffs” in the country (Ibid.).
Certainly ultimate responsibility resides in member states that were supposed to enforce the sanctions, but this does not excuse Kofi Annan and other administrative officers running the program. Kofi was to review the program with Bennon Sevan (whom he had appointed to oversee operation of the program every six months) and decide whether it was to continue. But instead of terminating the corrupted program when obvious sanction violations and breech of rules were apparent, they continued to urge expansion of the program (Ibid.).
Also a defining point when considering claims made by the Secretariat is that they were to receive 2.2 percent commission on every barrel of oil, from Saddam, to monitor Saddam. In addition an extra .8 percent was also collected to fund weapons inspections in Iraq. This could be considered a conflict of interest, because the larger the program became the more money would go to the Secretariat (Ibid.).
Oil-For-Food corruption is something important to consider when asking why the UN did not provide support for the Iraq war. Five countries had veto rights over the program; only two did any overseeing at all, UK and US. The other three, France, China, and Russia urged the expansion of the program, with paperwork from the contractors who Saddam had chosen to be his buyers/suppliers. Some of the UN members had lucrative contracts that would not be upheld if Saddam were removed from power. Saddam was given the opportunity to conspire with numerous oil-buyers as well as foreign governments and even the Secretariat. What took place over the seven-year lifespan of the program is corruption on a scale rarely seen before in human history. Trust of United Nations overseeing of a program that so many people depended on may have been misplaced. Oil-For-Food will surely play a large part when considering the future of the UN.

#2 Eli Van Brunt on 03.12.08 at 5:50 pm

Thought I should include this

Works Cited

“Annon stresses ‘vital importance’ of UN reforms in wake of Oil-for-Food report.” UN News Centre. 7 Sept. 2005. 8 Mar. 2006 http://www.un.org/apps/news/story.asp?NewsID=15703&Cr=iraq&Crl=oil#

Gardiner, PhD, Nile, and James Phillips. “Investigate the United Nations Oil-for-Food Fraud.” Policy Research & Analysis. 21 Apr. 2004. Heritage Foundation. 8 Mar. 2006

Graham-Brown, Sarah. Sanctioning Saddam the Politics of Intervention in Iraq. London/New York: I.B. Tauris, 1999. 44-46.

“Oil-for-Food Programme.” 8 Mar. 2006 .

Ritter, Scott. “The Oil-For-Food ‘Scandal’ is a Cynical Smokescreen.” CommonDreamsNewsCenter. 12 Dec. 2004. Mar. 2006 .

Rosett, Claudia. “The Oil-for-Food Scam: What Did Kofi Annon Know, and When Did He Know It?” Commentary. 8 Mar. 2006
Testani, Pam. “What’S Legitimate Now?” American Foreign Policy. 2004. Princeton University. 17 Apr. 2006 .

#3 Eli Van Brunt on 04.03.08 at 9:40 am

Justin, I thought you might find this interesting.

http://www.ornery.org/essays/warwatch/2008-03-23-1.html

It is a column by Orson Scott Card, regarding Hillary Clinton, and Michelle Obama’s thesis. It makes me want to read them for myself. I found his conclusions about Hilary’s writing to be rather amusing. Check it out.

-Eli

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