In 2003, Kofi Annan praised the UN’s oil-for-food programme, designed to allow a sanctioned Iraq to trade oil for food and medicine, “for accomplishing one of the largest, most complex and unusual tasks ever entrusted to the [UN] Secretariat”.
Today, an Australian report recommended that 11 AWB executives and the founder of BHP Billiton partner company Tigris face criminal investigations over the payment of $220 million in kickbacks to the Saddam regime to secure contracts worth $2.3 billion under the scheme.
Overall, about 2,200 groups from 66 countries made illegal payments of around $1.8 billion. The Australian government was cleared by today’s Cole report – but it was made clear that Australia’s image has been blackened.
Cole’s main casualty will probably be AWB’s monopoly status and its control over around 14 per cent of world wheat exports. Sadly, the biggest loser overall may be international trust in the UN to tackle “large, complex, and unusual” tasks.