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| Heritage Questions staffing of Volcker Commission | |
| 2004-09-21 | |
| Excerpt from a longer article that doesn't make me very optimistic that the Oil-For-Food scandal is going to be a "come to Jesus" moment for the UN. [...]It is therefore surprising to discover that the official spokesman for the Commission, Anna Di Lellio, is a former United Nations official. Moreover, Ms. Di Lellio, who is Director of Communications for Paul Volcker, has publicly expressed contempt for the U.S. president. In an interview with the London newspaper The Guardian on the first anniversary of the September 11 terrorist attacks, Ms. Di Lellio launched into a vicious tirade against the U.S. and Italian governments, implicitly comparing President George W. Bush and key U.S. ally Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi to Osama bin Laden: What I do feel is a sense of powerlessness against the changes which are potentially lethal for our civilization. But I see the major threats coming from ourselves, rather than the east. I find deeply unsettling both the ascendance of George Bush and his puppeteers to the U.S. government, and the mix of self-serving hypocrisy and incompetence prevailing in European governments. I don't like it that the two nations whose citizenship I hold, Italy and the U.S., have leased their institutions to a couple of families. With defenders like W and Berlusconi, largely unchecked by a sycophantic media, who needs Bin Laden to destroy culture, personal freedom, respect for other human beings, integrity, and the rule of law—all the things that make our lives worthwhile?[6] Such extreme opinions do not sit well with the Volcker Commission's claim to impartiality and will impede the establishment of a constructive relationship between the Commission, the U.S. Congress, and the executive branch of the United States... In meetings on Capitol Hill on July 13, Paul Volcker "rejected requests from members of Congress for access to review documents and to interview United Nations officials being scrutinized by his panel," reports the New York Times.[7] Congressional sources have confirmed that the Volcker Commission refuses to grant access to internal reports on the Oil-for-Food program produced by the U.N.'s Office of Internal Oversight Services and is unwilling to share documentation that it holds in Baghdad. It also refuses to guarantee that it will release documents relating to the Oil-for-Food program even after it has filed its final report. This hostile approach seriously undermines the credibility of the Independent Inquiry Committee.
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| Posted by:Anonymous4828 |
| #3 the biped shipman couldn't figure out a non-linear thought, wouldn't last 10 minutes in the big tank. |
| Posted by: Shamu 2004-09-21 6:11:46 PM |
| #2 Sorry, I missed the link when I posted. It was late. I have been disappointed in the lack of movement on Oil-for-Food. I saw only part of the Fox News report on the scandal on Sunday and hoped the ball would start rolling again. With respect to the debates, it would be interesting to see how Kerry would respond to being asked whether he agrees with Kofi's "illegal war" statement. I think that Kofi really meant "inconvenient interruption to my cash flow." |
| Posted by: Super Hose 2004-09-21 4:59:04 PM |
| #1 No source and no sense. |
| Posted by: Shipman 2004-09-21 1:42:42 PM |