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Russia Stalls UN Hunt for Iraqi Assets
EFLMoscow is shielding a former Iraqi ambassador to Russia and two top former Iraqi spies from a U.S.-led campaign to repatriate some of the billions of dollars in assets Saddam Hussein's regime stashed around the world, a senior U.S. official said. The United States, Britain and Iraq want the three men and a front company run by one of them added to a list of former Iraqi officials whose assets must be returned to the interim government in Baghdad under Security Council Resolution 1518, but permanent council member Russia won't allow it, U.S. Assistant Treasury Secretary Juan Carlos Zarate told a Senate committee investigating corruption in the UN's sanction program for Iraq. Of the 232 people, companies and other entities that Washington, London and Baghdad have asked to be put on the list, only four have been contested -- all by Russia. Zarate, the Treasury Department's point man for tracking terrorist and other criminal funds, said one of the three men, Nabil Abdullah al-Janabi, recruited foreigners to fight U.S. forces in Iraq, offering signing bonuses of $2,500. Al-Janabi was Iraq's ambassador to Lebanon before the March 2003 invasion and allegedly a senior official in the IIS, Hussein's secret intelligence service. Others enjoying Russia's protection, according to Zarate, are: Abbas Khalaf Kunfuth, Hussein's last ambassador to Moscow; Muhannad Juma al-Tamimi, an undercover agent for the IIS; and Bloto International Ltd., a Bangkok-registered front company run by al-Tamimi. Al-Tamimi is also wanted by Washington for allegedly plotting to kidnap and attack U.S. citizens in Thailand in January 2003, and for allegedly transferring explosives stored in the Iraqi Embassy in Bangkok to Baghdad in December 2001. "The UN 1518 Committee has not yet adopted these names because Russia has placed a hold on them and prevented committee action," Zarate said, according to official transcripts of his testimony Monday. "The departments of state and treasury have been working diligently to convince Russia to lift its hold." The Foreign Ministry in Moscow did not reply to requests for comment, but Russia's diplomatic mission to the United Nations downplayed the issue. The Russian delegation has placed a hold on the names for "technical reasons," a Russian official at the UN said Wednesday by telephone from New York. "There is no hot potato," said the official, who requested anonymity. "It is not ruled out that this hold will be canceled later. ... One should be careful in dealing with people's property." Posted by: tipper 2004-11-18 |
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