The Guardian 15 February, 2006
Wheat bribes, war and invasion
Tom Pearson
Once again, after being exposed as liars, the Howard Government is trying to lay the blame
for corruption at the feet of a government agency. The government claims that it knew
nothing about the payment of bribes to the Saddam Hussein regime by Australian Wheat
Board representatives in Iraq in the oil-for-food program, pointing the finger instead at the
Office of National Assessments. Howard said the agency, which reports to the government
on international developments, had had no information about the payments.
But Australian Treasury officials who had worked in the US occupation administration of Iraq told
the government more than two years ago of corruption in the selling of Australian wheat. In 2003
Treasury officials noted in a report that was sent to the Bush, Blair and Howard Governments: "The
previous regime required that 10 percent of the face value of contracts they submitted under the
oil-for-food program be paid directly to the regime."
Thus, Wheat Board officials bribed the regime to win contracts for Australian wheat, as opposed to
wheat from other countries: they were paying bribes through the back door even as the US, along
with Britain and Australia, invaded the country through the front door.
The oil-for-food program came out of the sanctions imposed on Iraq in 1990 by the UN following
that country's invasion of Kuwait. US bullying and manipulation ensured that the sanctions
continued after the Gulf War in 1991. This was despite warnings from the UN at the time that "the
Iraqi people may soon face further imminent catastrophe, which could include epidemic and
famine, if massive life supporting needs are not rapidly met."
The oil-for-food program began in December 1996. It was fundamentally flawed because it was
based on the false premise that sanctions could continue while at the same time the Iraqi people
could be protected from their impact. The sanctions were a crime against humanity, a disaster
causing the deaths of an estimated two million Iraqis and inflicting suffering on many
more.
The 1991 war and the sanctions severely weakened Iraq, its infrastructure, such as water, power
and health services, all but destroyed by US bombing. This softened the country up for the current
invasion and occupation which began in March 2003 based on the lie that there were weapons of
mass destruction in the country.
Initially, when the oil-for-food program was found to have been used to line the pockets of corrupt
companies and their compliant governments, the US used it to try and attack the UN
itself.
Undermining the UN is still high on the agenda of the Bush administration as reflected in their
choice of US representative at the world body, the stridently anti-UN campaigner, John
Bolton.
Now, here in Australia the chaff has hit the fan and the Howard Government is in full denial mode
in the face of one revelation after another that it knew full well what was going on. It is a
government that has been mired in lies and corruption from the time it came to office in
1996.
Howard even cynically posed as the defender of Australian farmers as the number of his ministers
implicated in the affair continued to grow. "We must take care that Australia's wheat farmers, who
have fought for years against the trade-distorting subsidies of competitors, and whose incomes are
only now beginning to recover from the drought, are not damaged in the fallout", said Howard last
week. He didn't mention the fallout farmers are already feeling from the trade-distorting Free Trade
Agreement between Australia and the US.