Britain 'trying to stall £1.3bn theft inquiry

[cal04]

Britain 'trying to stall £1.3bn theft inquiry that could hurt Allawi's election chances'

The British government is trying to stall an investigation into the theft of more than $1.3bn (£740m) from the Iraqi Ministry of Defence, senior Iraqi officials say. The government wants to postpone the investigation to help its favoured candidate Iyad Allawi, the former prime minister, in the election on 15 December. The money disappeared during his administration. The UK's enthusiasm for Mr Allawi may have led it into promoting a cover-up of how the money was siphoned off and sent abroad. One Iraqi minister believes the investigation will be dropped when the next government is formed. The scandal is expected to explode with renewed force in the next few weeks. The Independent has learnt of secret tape recordings of a wide-ranging conversation between a Ministry of Defence official and a businessman, naming politicians and officials involved.

"It is possibly one of the largest thefts in history," Ali Allawi, Iraq's Finance Minister, said. "Huge amounts of money have disappeared. In return we got nothing but scraps of metal." Most of the military purchases were made in Poland and Pakistan. They included obsolete helicopters, armoured vehicles unable to stop a bullet and grossly over-priced machine guns and bullets. Payments were made in advance. Often the Ministry of Defence did not even have a copy of contracts under which it was paying hundreds of millions of dollars. Ahmed Chalabi, the Deputy Prime Minister, says William Patey, the British ambassador in Baghdad, asked him not to give prominence to the scandal before the election because this might "politicise the investigation". Mr Patey denies he had asked for the investigation to be delayed.

A former senior British adviser was quoted as saying that Tony Blair was convinced Mr Allawi "is the best hope" for Iraq. He added that Mr Blair had sent a small team of operatives to give political help to Mr Allawi. In background briefings, British officials have heavily supported the former prime minister despite evidence that government corruption was rife under his administration. Mr Allawi is a former member of the Baath party who fell out with Saddam Hussein in the 1970s. Resident in Britain for many years, he became the leader of an opposition group, the Iraqi National Accord. He has never denied a close association with British intelligence and the CIA said he was justified in taking support from any foreign intelligence service willing to help him fight Saddam.


Supporters of Mr Allawi have denounced allegations about widespread fraud while he was prime minister in 2004-05 as an attempt to damage him before a close-fought election next week. But documents seen by The Independent show Mr Allawi's office authorising astonishingly large sums of money to be spent by the Defence Ministry. The cabinet was excluded at the request of Hazem al-Shaalan, the Defence Minister. He asked for and received permission from the prime minister's office to spend money without oversight in September 2004, citing the gravity of the crisis facing the Iraq. In November, Mr Shaalan received a letter from the cabinet secretariat saying the prime minister had agreed to spend $1.7bn "for the purpose of creating two rapid intervention divisions". By the winter of 2004, large sums were being sent out of Iraq in sacks filled with $100 bills loaded on to planes. One shipment of $300m was noticed and intercepted

http://news.independent.co.uk/world/middle_east/article331947.ece

[muriel_volestrangler]

1. Blair is standing by his "45 minutes to launch WMD" informant

The choice of Iyad Allawi, closely linked to the CIA and formerly to MI6, as the Prime Minister of Iraq from 30 June will make it difficult for the US and Britain to persuade the rest of the world that he is capable of leading an independent government.

He is the person through whom the controversial claim was channeled that Iraqi weapons of mass destruction could be operational in 45 minutes.

http://www.commondreams.org/headlines04/0529-02.htm

And now he's actively trying to get him elected. Hey Tony, governments interfering in other countries elections is wrong. Especially when it's my money you're doing it with, you corrupt wanker.