 The head of the Iraq Oil-for-Food Program investigation has formally presented an interim report to United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan. Paul Volcker, chairman of The Independent Inquiry Committee into the Iraq Oil-for Food Program, brought the report Thursday to U.N. World Headquarters in New York from the panel's offices a few blocks away. He did not comment to reporters. However, Volcker, former chairman of the U.S. Federal Reserve, in a Wall Street Journal op-ed piece Thursday said, "The findings do not make for pleasant reading." He said the humanitarian program's "procurement process was tainted" and "the management responsiveness critical to achieving a fully effective auditing process were lacking. | But, before you get your hopes up..... |
"The management of program administrative funds appears free of systematic or widespread abuse." | Kofi gets off, but they seem to have decided on a scapegoat.. |
But he found "disheartening" the performance of the program's chief, saying, "The evidence is conclusive that (Benon) Sevan ... placed himself in an irreconcilable conflict of interest, in violation both of specific U.N. rules and of the broad responsibility of an international civil servant." |