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September 17, 2005

The UN's Strong-man

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Claudia Rosett, who should have gotten a Pulitzer Prize for her coverage of the developing UN scandals, has a highly intriguing article today in the New York Sun, regarding the so—far unnamed UN officials indicted on charges of receiving large bribes to help set up the Oil For Food Program in a manner congenial to the interests of Saddam Hussein.

But first, and importantly, the Sun notes:

Maybe Mr. Annan should ask a longtime United Nations undersecretary general, Maurice Strong, special adviser to the secretary—general since 1999 and currently Mr. Annan's personal envoy to the Korean Peninsula.

The New York Sun is not asserting, or even suggesting, that Mr. Strong himself is one of the U.N. officials in question. But Mr. Strong's history indicates he might be especially well—placed to offer insights into at least the likely identity of U.N. official #2, who according to the indictment had family business ties to Canada, and along with U.N. official #1, met with Mr. Park sometime around 1996 — the year the flawed terms of oil—for—food took shape.

The American Thinker joins the NYS in not assering or suggesting any impropriety on Mr. Strong's part. But the circumstances are quite interesting. Read the whole thing.

Ed Lasky   4 18 05