October 6, 2006
Now comes Kofi Annan, Secretary General of the United Nut Cases, uh United Nations, and a person of interest in the Iraq oil for food scandal, saying he won’t release his financial disclosure form.
This decision comes ten months after Annan ordered all senior UN officials to file the forms. A guess some senior officials are more equal than others.
A UN spokesperson said Annan had filed the forms, but they wouldn’t be made public. Does that suggest to anyone that he might have something to hide? Massive fraud was discovered in a $64 billion program run by the UN that allowed Saddam Husseinf’s Iraq to sell a limited amount of oil to feed the Iraqi people during a period in which sanctions were imposed on Saddam’s regime. Annan was cleared of personal involvement in the scandal, but questions were raised about the conduct of his son, Kojo, who worked for a company that won a major oil-for-food contract.
The UN is a mess and has been for a very long time. Kofi Annan should be pressured into releasing documents everyone else must make public. Otherwise the cloud of suspicion will remain.
Cal Thomas is a nationally syndicated columnist based in Washington, D.C.
