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Lawmaker Wants French to Answer Bribe Charges

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Lawmaker Wants French to Answer Bribe Charges
Friday, October 22, 2004

NEW YORK — A lawmaker heading one of Congress’ investigations into the U.N. Oil-for-Food program sent a letter to French President Jacques Chirac (search) asking for his full cooperation and insisting French government officials meet with his committee.

Rep. Joe Barton R-Texas, chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, sent the letter Friday to highlight some of the findings of a recent report by the CIA’s Iraq Survey Group.

The report, also known as the Duelfer report after chief author Charles Duelfer, suggested that French businessmen and politicians with close ties to Chirac may have received bribes from Saddam Hussein.
It also said that that French companies may have sold weapons to Iraq on the eve of the U.S.-led war against Iraq in 2003.

• Click here to read the report's key findings (pdf).

“These allegations of bribery and illegal weapons sales are extremely serious, and, if true, cast doubt upon the effectiveness and independence of the United Nations. I very much hope that you will assist this committee in its efforts to shed light on possible abuses of the Oil for Food program,” Barton wrote. To read the full text of the letter, scroll to the bottom of this story.

Chirac has thus far remained silent on the role Oil-for-Food case may have played in influencing France’s policy toward Iraq.

The French have not answered the allegations against them in any detail but the French ambassador to the United States told FOX News last week the French government is not for sale.

On Thursday, U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan said he would be shocked if any Security Council nation had effectively sold its vote to Saddam. Also Thursday, the U.N.-authorized independent investigation of Oil-for-Food released the most complete list yet of who did business under Oil-for-Food.

The accounting by the Independent Inquiry Committee showed that the 248 companies — which span the globe — paid Iraq the equivalent of $64.2 billion for oil, and that the 3,545 companies that exported goods to south and central Iraq received payments totaling the equivalent of $32.9 billion.

• List of Program Companies (pdf)

The program was created in late 1996 as a way to get such supplies to the Iraqi people by selling Iraqi oil and ease some of the hardships created by the strict sanctions placed against Saddam following the first Gulf War.

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