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BAGHDAD, Jan 29: An Iraqi newspaper report on foreign dignitaries and firms that allegedly profited from oil handouts under Saddam Hussein has sparked denials across the globe.
A list published on Sunday in Iraq's Al Mada newspaper of oil contracts passed by the State Oil Organisation (SOMO) that included the names of around 200 people, political organizations and religious figures who it said received free crude, prompted further denials on Thursday by those named.
The handouts ran into millions of barrels between 1999 and 2002, all sold for a commission. The Iraqi oil ministry has confirmed that the documents are authentic.
In Sofia, Bulgaria's opposition Socialist Party denied taking oil bribes from Saddam but said one of its members did oil trade with the regime. Zakhari Zakhariev, a member of the socialists' executive committee, has admitted to having negotiated oil deliveries for his company Machinoexport as part of the UN-run oil-for-food programme that allowed Iraqi oil exports under Saddam, Socialist Party president Sergei Stanichev said.
He said the socialists did not receive any money in connection with Machinoexport's deal and that Zakhariev was not authorised to represent the party.
In Bratislava, Slovakia's opposition communist party also denied having received coupons good for four million barrels of oil. "It's not true. The Slovakian communist party did not have relations with the regime of Saddam Hussein," party vice-president Karol Frajnor told AFP.
Former right-wing Hungarian politician Izabella Kiraly is also listed but Hungarian law enforcement authorities investigated the charge in 2000 and found no proof that Kiraly received the alleged 4.7 million barrels of oil, the Magyar Hirlap newspaper said in Budapest.
And in New Delhi, the Congress party vehemently denied that it had received free oil from Saddam Hussein as a gift for its support for his rule. "It's such a ridiculous, baseless, vague story that it does not deserve a response," Congress spokesman S. Jaipal Reddy said.
Turkish companies, Bahraini and Jordanian businessmen, a French Catholic priest, Russian ultranationalist Vladimir Zhirinovsky and Russia's Communist Party are also among those listed and who have denied the allegations.
SYRIA TO RETURN MONEY: An Iraqi official said on Thursday Syria's president had pledged to return Iraqi funds held in Syria after both countries agree on the amount - put at three billion dollars by Baghdad.
"President Bashar al Assad assured us that the Iraqi funds in Syria are safe and that he was willing to hand them over to Iraqi authorities," Mowaffaq al Rubaie, a member of Iraq's US-appointed Governing Council, told a news conference in Damascus after meeting Assad.
Iraqi officials have said the funds in Syrian state-run banks amount to three billion dollars, but their Syrian counterparts say the amount is in hundreds of millions of dollars and that a process is underway to deduct funds owed to Syrian firms before the balance is returned.
Diplomats say the money was deposited in Syrian banks by Iraq's former government. Rubaie said Assad told him that he did not wish to hand over the funds to the US-led occupation forces in Iraq. "This is a very legitimate request (by Assad)," he said.
He said he would ask the Council to send officials to Damascus to discuss the technicalities of the return. Rubaie and Council colleague Yonadam Kanna said they had also discussed security issues with Assad, as well as ways of stimulating economic and other cooperation between the two Arab neighbours.
The United States has repeatedly accused Syria of not doing enough to prevent Islamist militants slipping into Iraq across the long desert border between them, to attack occupying forces in the country.
"Fingers are not pointed at Syria - Syria the state and the government - for involvement in any terrorist operations in Iraq...but Syrian borders like those of other neighbours of Iraq can be used to penetrate to Iraq for sabotage and terror operations," Rubaie said.-AFP / Reuters
