http://www.thenation.com/doc.mhtml?i=20050110&s=williams
January 10, 2005 issue
The Nation.
The Right's Assault on Kofi Annan
by IAN WILLIAMS
<snip>
Listening to the cable pundits, you would never suspect that there is
no proof at this point that Annan, or indeed anyone else at the UN,
did anything wrong. Charges of corruption against UN official Benon
Sevan are suspect at best, given that they come via Ahmad Chalabi, who
was also the source of the discredited information about Iraq's
illusory weapons, as well as the assurances that Iraqis would greet US
and British forces as liberators. Nor is there any evidence that Annan
used his influence to give Cotecna, a company that employed his son,
the job of monitoring contracts under the oil-for-food program, and no
proof that Cotecna did anything illegal or corrupt. Although Annan's
son certainly let his father down by not telling him of Cotecna's
continuing "non-compete" payments to him, paternal resignations in
response to the sins of prodigal sons have not been a great American
tradition--certainly not under the Bush dynasty.
There are real questions about Saddam Hussein's oil sales, both inside
and outside the oil-for-food program, but all the serious
investigations, such as that by the US Government Accountability
Office, make it clear that most of the revenue he raised had nothing
to do with the UN, and that the UN did nothing without the explicit or
implicit support of the United States acting through the Security
Council.
The rest (which has a surprising amount to add throughout) is at:
http://www.thenation.com/doc.mhtml?i=20050110&s=williams
Michael