[Shadow_Group] Fw: Secretary-General Kofi Annan

[shadowgroup-l at lists.resist.ca]

CNN.com

UNITED NATIONS (CNN) -- U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan said Monday he
was "disappointed and surprised" to learn that his son, Kojo, had
remained on the payroll of a company involved in the Iraq oil-for-food
program, the subject of several corruption probes.

Kojo Annan received money for consulting work done in Africa for Geneva,
Switzerland-based Cotecna Inspection, which was hired to verify whether
food, medicine and other goods entering Iraq were on the approved list
under the $64 billion oil-for-food program.

The United Nations previously said the payments stopped after Kojo Annan
left the firm in 1997.

Earlier this year, it revised that statement, saying the younger Annan
received money through the end of 1998 under an agreement not to compete
with Cotecna in West Africa.

Cotecna had said the payments to Annan were halted when the firm won the
contract to inspect oil-for-food humanitarian shipments starting in
December 1998.

But late last week the United Nations said Kojo Annan had received
payments as recently as February 2004 under the non-compete agreement.

The company said Swiss law required that it continue the payments for the
length of time the younger Annan was prohibited from working for a
competitor under the agreement.

At least six investigations are under way into the defunct oil-for-food
program -- several in the U.S. Congress and one by an independent U.N.
panel headed by former Federal Reserve Chairman Paul Volcker. (Full
story)

Kofi Annan told reporters Monday he understands that with this latest
oil-for-food news the United Nations faces the perception "of conflict of
interests and wrongdoing."

"Naturally I was very disappointed and surprised," Annan said, when he
learned his son had not fully disclosed his continued involvement with
Cotecna.

He said he has spoken with his son, but he declined to reveal what was
said.

Annan said he has "warm family relations with his son, but he is in a
different field. He is an independent businessman. He is a grown man, and
I don't get involved with his activities and he doesn't get involved in
mine."

Annan said he had no personal involvement in the granting of contracts to
businesses that participated in the oil-for-food program.

He walked away without a response to questions about calls for his
resignation in opinion articles published in the Wall Street Journal and
New York Times.

U.N. spokesman Fred Eckhard was quoted by Reuters as saying that those
who signed the inspection deal with Cotecna in 1998 contended they did
not know that Kojo Annan, then a trainee, worked for the firm at the
time.

No formal charges of wrongdoing have been made against Kojo Annan, who is
based in Nigeria.

Reuters reported that no evidence has been found that he worked on the
Iraq project for Cotecna, which also was hired by the U.S.-led coalition
in Iraq until mid-2004.

The oil-for-food program began in December 1996 to alleviate the effect
of U.N. economic sanctions on ordinary Iraqis.

Under supervision by the U.N. secretariat and Security Council, the
government of dictator Saddam Hussein was permitted to sell oil and buy
civilian supplies. The program was halted after the U.S.-led invasion in
2003.

In October, former U.N. weapons inspector Charles Duelfer said in a
report for the CIA that Saddam's government routinely violated the
sanctions, earning an estimated $7.5 billion in cash mainly by smuggling
oil outside the U.N. program.

Saddam's government earned another $3 billion in kickbacks on oil and
other schemes under the program, Reuters reported Duelfer's report as
saying.

The General Accountability Office, the investigative arm of Congress,
reported similar estimates.

A U.S. Senate committee said earlier this month that the amount of money
Saddam earned by subverting the program may be more that twice the
estimates by Duelfer and the GAO. (Full story)

U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. John Danforth said Monday that the United
States considers the allegations made about the oil-for-food program
"very serious."

"The investigation has to be very comprehensive," Danforth said. "We have
to get to the bottom of this. It has to be done in a very professional
fashion. It shouldn't be prejudged. Let the chips fall where they may."

Danforth said he favors having Volcker's panel turn over information to
U.S. congressional committees that are demanding sharing of all
oil-for-food files.

So far, Volcker has refused to do so, and Danforth said he saw no
immediate resolution to the deadlock on that issue.

Volcker's panel is due to issue an initial report in January and a full
report by mid-year, Reuters reported.

Republican Rep. Henry Hyde of Illinois, chairman of the House
International Relations Committee, introduced a bill November 17 that
demands heightened U.N. accountability.

Reuters reported Hyde as saying that U.N. audits he had obtained
"identified mismanagement and uneconomical' arrangements" by Cotecna.

Asked if Kofi Annan should resign, Danforth was quoted by Reuters as
saying, "I don't think that the United States government rushes to
judgment until all the facts are in."

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