N7AAO
12-06-2004, 07:27 PM
Courtesy Canadian National Post (http://www.canada.com/national/nationalpost/news/comment/story.html?id=6e57a820-683c-4853-baaa-3787d7612019):
Quote[/b] ]Last Wednesday, Norm Coleman, a Republican from Minnesota and co-chairman of the U.S. Senate subcommittee investigating the United Nations oil-for-food program in Iraq, called on UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan to resign in a commentary published in The Wall Street Journal. While Britain, Germany, France, Russia and China quickly rallied to Mr. Annan's defence, there can be no doubt that the senator is correct: Mr. Annan has to go.
As Mr. Coleman argues, "the most extensive fraud in the history of the United Nations occurred on [Mr. Annan's] watch." Over the decade-long run of the oil-for-food program, the UN and several member states looked on as Saddam Hussein siphoned off at least 20% of its $100-billion revenues for his personal use. Hundreds of millions went to rebuilding the Iraqi army; more was paid out in kickbacks to Western politicians, governments, political parties, journalists and UN officials who looked the other way. Tens of millions funded terrorist training and operations around the world, particularly among Palestinians. The grandiose, sprawling palaces U.S. troops discovered when they liberated Baghdad and other Iraqi cities were constructed by Saddam and his family with the proceeds from oil sales meant to pay for food and medicines for ordinary Iraqis. Critics of the American- and British-backed sanctions against Iraq that were in place from the early 1990s until the 2003 invasion claimed they were responsible for the deaths of 100,000 Iraqis per year through malnutrition and disease. But we now know it was Saddam's lust for gold plumbing fixtures and weapons that caused the lion's share of Iraqi hardship.
Under Mr. Annan's leadership, the UN feigned blindness to all this. To make matters worse, it recently became clear that Mr. Annan's son Kojo was a beneficiary of oil-for-food largesse. The Swiss firm appointed to certify that Iraqi oil sale proceeds were indeed going to buy human essentials (which clearly was not doing its job) paid the junior Annan hundreds of thousands of dollars in untendered consulting contracts. And while Mr. Annan once claimed Kojo's financial affiliation with the company ended long ago, it has now come to light that it continued till well after Saddam's fall from power.
[...]
Even putting Iraq and the oil-for-food scandal aside, the case against Mr. Annan is damning. While Mr. Annan made some early progress in streamlining the United Nations' grotesquely bloated bureaucracy, he has since presided over a crisis in staff confidence, in part thanks to his bungled efforts to sweep aside sexual harassment charges against one of his deputies. Two weeks ago, UN workers in New York City voted that they had lost faith in the Secretary-General's ability and that of his senior administrators.
Mr. Annan has also watched as the UN Human Rights Commission has degenerated into a laughingstock run by some of the worst human-rights abusers in the world. He has refused to stop the UN agency responsible for delivering humanitarian aid to Palestinian refugees from assisting terrorists. And from Rwanda to Srebrenica, East Timor to Sudan, he has time and again permitted himself to be conned by tyrants and butchers while they have murdered hundreds of thousands of innocents.
I don't think I can add much to that, except to remind everyone that this is coming from good old liberal Canada.
http://www.qrz.com/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/unclesam.gif
Quote[/b] ]Last Wednesday, Norm Coleman, a Republican from Minnesota and co-chairman of the U.S. Senate subcommittee investigating the United Nations oil-for-food program in Iraq, called on UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan to resign in a commentary published in The Wall Street Journal. While Britain, Germany, France, Russia and China quickly rallied to Mr. Annan's defence, there can be no doubt that the senator is correct: Mr. Annan has to go.
As Mr. Coleman argues, "the most extensive fraud in the history of the United Nations occurred on [Mr. Annan's] watch." Over the decade-long run of the oil-for-food program, the UN and several member states looked on as Saddam Hussein siphoned off at least 20% of its $100-billion revenues for his personal use. Hundreds of millions went to rebuilding the Iraqi army; more was paid out in kickbacks to Western politicians, governments, political parties, journalists and UN officials who looked the other way. Tens of millions funded terrorist training and operations around the world, particularly among Palestinians. The grandiose, sprawling palaces U.S. troops discovered when they liberated Baghdad and other Iraqi cities were constructed by Saddam and his family with the proceeds from oil sales meant to pay for food and medicines for ordinary Iraqis. Critics of the American- and British-backed sanctions against Iraq that were in place from the early 1990s until the 2003 invasion claimed they were responsible for the deaths of 100,000 Iraqis per year through malnutrition and disease. But we now know it was Saddam's lust for gold plumbing fixtures and weapons that caused the lion's share of Iraqi hardship.
Under Mr. Annan's leadership, the UN feigned blindness to all this. To make matters worse, it recently became clear that Mr. Annan's son Kojo was a beneficiary of oil-for-food largesse. The Swiss firm appointed to certify that Iraqi oil sale proceeds were indeed going to buy human essentials (which clearly was not doing its job) paid the junior Annan hundreds of thousands of dollars in untendered consulting contracts. And while Mr. Annan once claimed Kojo's financial affiliation with the company ended long ago, it has now come to light that it continued till well after Saddam's fall from power.
[...]
Even putting Iraq and the oil-for-food scandal aside, the case against Mr. Annan is damning. While Mr. Annan made some early progress in streamlining the United Nations' grotesquely bloated bureaucracy, he has since presided over a crisis in staff confidence, in part thanks to his bungled efforts to sweep aside sexual harassment charges against one of his deputies. Two weeks ago, UN workers in New York City voted that they had lost faith in the Secretary-General's ability and that of his senior administrators.
Mr. Annan has also watched as the UN Human Rights Commission has degenerated into a laughingstock run by some of the worst human-rights abusers in the world. He has refused to stop the UN agency responsible for delivering humanitarian aid to Palestinian refugees from assisting terrorists. And from Rwanda to Srebrenica, East Timor to Sudan, he has time and again permitted himself to be conned by tyrants and butchers while they have murdered hundreds of thousands of innocents.
I don't think I can add much to that, except to remind everyone that this is coming from good old liberal Canada.
http://www.qrz.com/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/unclesam.gif