UNscam

UNscam is the name given to the scandal surrounding the United Nations Oil-for-Food Program. The story began to unfold on January 25, 2004, when the independent Baghdad weekly al-Mada (in Arabic) "published a list of 270 people and organizations that allegedly received valuable oil vouchers from the government of Saddam Hussein between 1996 and 2002. On the list were the names of "multi-national corporations, UN officials, and top French and Russian politicians ... who had received oil contracts from Saddam in exchange for either supporting the Iraqi regime, helping Saddam import illegal materials, or simply ignoring the ongoing corruption. These beneficiaries could then turn around and sell the contracts to legitimate oil traders, making a tidy profit." The story was then translated into English by the Middle East Media Research Institute. [1][2]

External links

• Larry Chin, "The deep politics of regime removal in Iraq: Overt conquest, covert operations," Online Journal, November 21, 2002.
• "Iraq enlists first trading houses," Reuters, July 10, 2003.
• Claudio Gatti and Mark Turner, "Dealing with Saddam's Regime," Financial Times, April 7, 2004.
• Mortimer B. Zuckerman, "A tangled web, unraveled," USNews.com, April 26, 2004.
• Jefferson Morley, "From a Baghdad Weekly, a Global Scandal," Washington Post, April 29, 2004.
• T. Christian Miller, "Americans among beneficiaries in oil scandal," Seattle Times, October 9, 2004.
• Jess Braven, John D. Mckinnon, and Russel Gold, "IRAQ: Oil-for-Food probe hits U.S. Oil Companies. Exxon, Chevron and El Paso Are Named in CIA Report On Hussein-Era Program," Wall Street Journal, October 13, 2004.
• T. Christian Miller, "U.S. Buyers of Hussein's Oil Acted to Assist Iraq (Los Angeles Times)," Seattle Times, October 18, 2004.
• Michael Maiello, "The Saddam Shuffle," iraq.net, October 29, 2004.
• "'UNscam' Revisited Mother Jones, November 18, 2004.
• "A paper trail to US oil company. US Oil Company in on it?," Friends of Saddam, December 1, 2004.
• "Zhirinovsky named in oil-for-food scandal," Native New Yorker, December 1, 2004: "Another document lists a payment of $546,000 to [Russian oil company] Tyumen by Bayoil, headed by tycoon David Chalmers, whose office declined to comment."
• "New Zhirinovsky Claim on Iraq Oil," Moscow Times, December 2, 2004: "Millions of barrels of Iraqi oil allocated to Liberal Democratic Party leader Vladimir Zhirinovsky by former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein were ultimately purchased by U.S. oil company Bayoil, the Financial Times and Il Sole 24 Ore, an Italian business newspaper, reported Wednesday as part of a joint investigation."
• "Hyde Issues Subpoenas, Wants Wider Investigation Into United Nations," Fox News, February 10, 2005.
• Larry Neumeister, "Four charged in U.N. oil-for-food scandal," AP, April 14, 2005.
• Colum Lynch and Michelle Garcia, "American Indicted In Iraq Oil Probe", Washington Post, April 15, 2005. Information about David B. Chalmers, Jr., a Texas oil executive involved in the oil-for-food fraud.
• Julia Preston and Judith Miller, "Oil-for-Food Scandal Broadens With New Charges," New York Times, April 15, 2005.
• "The Justice Department is on the ball. Justice does it the right way," Friends of Saddam, April 15, 2005.