Panel One of a Hearing of the National Security, Emerging Threats & International Relations Subcommittee of the House Government Reform Committee...

Federal News Service October 5, 2004 Tuesday

HEADLINE: PANEL ONE OF A HEARING OF THE NATIONAL SECURITY, EMERGING THREATS & INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS SUBCOMMITTEE OF THE HOUSE GOVERNMENT REFORM COMMITTEE

SUBJECT: UNITED NATIONS OIL-FOR-FOOD PROGRAM

CHAIRED BY: REP. CHRIS SHAYS (R-CT)

PANEL I WITNESS: PATRICK KENNEDY, U.S. REPRESENTATIVE TO THE UNITED NATIONS FOR MANAGEMENT REFORM;

STATEMENT PROVIDED BY: CHRISTINE GRENIER (PH), REPRESENTING THE FRENCH EMBASSY

BODY:

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REP. STEPHEN LYNCH (D-MA): Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I too believe that there's a very strong need to carry out a thorough investigation in the circumstances.

I'd like to focus on, however, with the ambassador's cooperation, the facts that led us to this point. Here we have a situation where this oil-for-food program was established back in 1995, after we had fought the first Gulf War, and it was established specifically because Saddam Hussein had run that country into the ground. He had failed to address the infrastructure needs and the humanitarian needs of his own people. He had used the country's natural resources as his own slush fund. He had used the basic funds that were in the treasury, the national treasury, at his own pleasure. He had ignored the basic health and welfare of his citizens in favor of a military build-up. Saddam Hussein waged wars against Iran, invaded Kuwait. He had fired Scud missiles into the citizen populations-the civilian populations of Israel. And we fought a war to remove him from power, to remove him from Kuwait initially. And even with the evidence of his own atrocities, and the evidence of his corrupt activities between him and his sons, squandering the wealth of that country and abusing its citizens, after the United States took a leadership role in establishing this fund, and deciding who would contract for the Iraqi people with this fund of $20 billion, after that worldwide search, who would negotiate and who would control the terms for the Iraqi people, the responsibility was given to those same people, Saddam Hussein and his thugs, his family, the people that had been abusing that country for the previous 40 years.

That was the colossal failure here, that we allowed Saddam Hussein to call the terms of that agreement, and he had the support of some of our international neighbors in getting the most favorable terms, having a private bank handle this. We could not get information under the arrangement that was agreed to between the U.N., Kofi Annan, Secretary-General, and Saddam Hussein and his regime. How did we ever allow ourselves to be put in this position, how did we allow the victims here, and there are three sets of victims-one, the Iraqi people, this was their natural wealth, this was their country, their resources; the American taxpayer footing the bill again; and also the credibility of the United Nations. There are great misgivings here because of what has gone on. There is a definite --

I haven't been on this committee that long. I've come to this committee recently. I've been here, this will be almost three years I've been on this committee, and I can tell you there's a definite reluctance to investigate anything on this committee. I'm still waiting after three meetings with the Defense Department to get the names of some Halliburton individuals who they have removed for bribery and corrupt practices with individuals in Iraq and in the Middle East. On an investigatory committee in the Congress, and we can't get the names of our own people when they have conceded that they are involved in bribery and corrupt practices in which the taxpayers' funds have disappeared in the millions. We need to do our job here, and I believe we will get to it eventually. But there's been tremendous wrongdoing here, and we have to step up to the plate and do what the American people have asked us to do, get to the bottom of this.

I yield back, Mr. Chairman, thank you.

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