Iraq - UN Investigator Quit Over Cover Up

CNN reports.

One of two investigators who resigned earlier this week from the commission probing fraud at the United Nations' oil-for-food program released a statement Saturday in which he disputed a report that he did so because his work was finished.

Instead, Robert Parton said in the statement, he resigned "on principle."

So, once again, the UN lied.

And one of three leaders of the committee, Mark Pieth, denies Volckers report exonerated Annan.

Parton is one of the two "senior investigators with the committee probing corruption in the U.N. oil-for-food program" to quit.

Two senior investigators with the committee probing corruption in the U.N. oil-for-food program have resigned in protest, saying they believe a report that cleared Kofi Annan of meddling in the $64 billion operation was too soft on the secretary-general, a panel member confirmed Wednesday.

The investigators felt the Independent Inquiry Committee, led by former U.S. Federal Reserve chairman Paul Volcker, played down findings critical of Annan when it released an interim report in late March related to his son, said Mark Pieth, one of three leaders of the committee.

"You follow a trail and you want to see people pick it up," Pieth told The Associated Press, referring to the two top investigators who left. The committee "told the story" that the investigators presented, "but we made different conclusions than they would have."

And now we learn that Volcker himself, as well as the Canadian Prime Minister, are linked to the Scandal.

Let's hope Congress's investigation gets more results and Annan is forced to go.

UPDATE

Glenn Reynolds has more and notes this:

I'm just interested in seeing how money seemed to be flowing from Saddam Hussein to pretty much every government that took an active role in opposing the Iraq war. And I wonder where else the money was going. I suspect we'll find out, in time.

I hope so.

UPDATE

More from Business Week

A senior investigator from Paul Volcker's independent committee into allegations of corruption in the U.N. oil-for-food program criticized his former employer Saturday for misrepresenting the grounds for his resignation earlier this month.

The investigator, Robert Parton, confirmed a report by The Associated Press earlier this week that he had resigned along with another investigator to protest recent findings by the committee that cleared U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan of meddling in the $64 billion program.

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