CORPORATE CRIME REPORTER
Former
Director of United Nations Oil-for Food-Program Indicted
21 Corporate Crime Reporter 4, January 16, 2007
Benon Sevan, the former executive director of the United Nation’s Oil-for-Food-Program,
was indicted today in federal court in Manhattan.
Also indicted was Ephraim Nadler, a former agent for the Iraqi regime.
Federal officials alleged that the Iraqi government conditioned the right to
purchase oil under the United Nation’s program on the purchaser’s
willingness to pay a “secret surcharge” to Iraq.
Federal officials alleged that these payments were illegal kickbacks made in
violation of then standing United Nation’s sanctions and U.S. criminal
law.
Sevan allegedly received approximately $160,000 – money generated from
the sale of Iraqi oil under the program – from Nadler on behalf of the
government of Iraq.
Nadler is alleged to have helped an unnamed coconspirator to obtain the right
to buy Iraqi oil under the Oil-for-Food Program in exchange for commissions
from the oil sales, and then allegedly funneled approximately $160,000 of these
oil commissions to Sevan.
Nadler and Sevan were charged with fraud, bribery, and conspiracy.
"The Oil-for-Food Program was created to provide critical humanitarian
aid to the Iraqi people,” said U.S. Attorney Michael Garcia. “But
the former government of Iraq thoroughly corrupted the Program – by employing
undisclosed Iraqi agents in the United States to try to influence the terms
under which the program was adopted, and by demanding secret kickbacks from
participants in the program during its operation. The allegations in this current
indictment that the executive director of the very program that was created
to provide humanitarian aid to the Iraqi people was involved in such a scheme
demonstrates how pervasive the corruption was, and how that corruption undermined
the operation of the program."
The Sevan and Nadler indictments bring to 14 the number of individuals charged
or convicted in the investigation.
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