-----Original Message----- From: Alamaine <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: CTRL <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Sent: Fri, 11 Apr 2008 6:53 am Subject: [ctrl] Cash, contracts and crown princes | World news | The Guardian http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2008/apr/11/bae.armstrade3 Cash, contracts and crown princes David Leigh The Guardian, Friday April 11 2008 The BAE Eurofighter Typhoon military jet plane leaves smoke trails at an air show in Paris. Photograph: Jerome Delay/AP Evidence of an allegedly corrupt relationship between BAE and the Saudi royal family began to emerge four years ago. Using documents obtained from whistleblowers and files in the National Archives, the Guardian began to build a picture of an arms company willing to provide anything from fleets of Rolls-Royces to mountains of offshore cash in order to promote lucrative deals with the Saudi regime. As the allegations mounted, the British government tried to cover up the facts, not only about apparent arms company corruption but about the connivance of a succession of ministers, both Labour and Tory, in worldwide bribery on behalf of Great Britain plc. The Guardian turned over its evidence to Robert Wardle, the head of the SFO, and he embarked on an investigation. The UK, on paper at least, had promised to crackdown on corrupt practices. It had signed up to an international anti-bribery treaty, brokered by the OECD, and in 2002 the government passed a law making it clear that overseas bribery was a crime. Labour ministers trumpeted their probity and the Foreign Office even produced a DVD with the title Crimes of the Establishment as part of their toolkit on the evils of corruption. But Lord Justice Moses' judgment yesterday lays bare what actually happened. In doing so, he appears to accept allegations that have swirled round Whitehall since Wardle announced he was to drop his investigation 18 months ago - although without hearing evidence from Bandar. Wardle's inquiries were bearing fruit, and he was on the brink of obtaining bank records from Switzerland. These belonged, among others, to the billionaire Syrian intermediary Wafic Said, who played a major role in brokering the £43bn al-Yamamah arms deal back in the mid-80s. He is a confidant of Crown Prince Sultan, and of his son, Prince Bandar. Prior to the investigation being halted, the SFO were looking into payments by BAE into Said's accounts. Moses, who insisted on seeing privately the full version of government documents in the case, made clear what happened next. He detailed allegations that Bandar set out to have the inquiry stopped. Yesterday's summary described reports of Bandar going to see Jonathan Powell, Blair's chief of staff. He is said to have told him and the British ambassador, Sherard Cowper-Cowles, that he would ensure Saudi intelligence links were cut unless he and his family were kept out of the case. Bandar then flew to Paris and engaged in ostentatious negotiations with the French to buy a new batch of fighter jets - the contract BAE itself was after. As the judge pointed out yesterday, Bandar was suspected of complicity with BAE, the target of the investigation. He admits he received from BAE a present of a new Airbus commercial airliner, and payments totalling £1bn into his US account, although he says they were not improper. Tony Blair's office told Wardle that "innocent British lives were at risk" because Saudi Arabia would no longer help prevent terrorist outrages if the investigation went ahead. BAE, and a number of MPs in whose constituencies the company has factories, joined in with claims that "jobs were at risk". Moses made clear yesterday that he shared the suspicions of anti-corruption campaigners that much of this was a charade. The word the judge used was "pretext". He pointed out that Downing Street had rolled over with suspicious ease to Saudi threats. Getting the case dropped was convenient to the government, and convenient to BAE. The high court's words about the importance of the rule of law and the need to stand up to attempts to pervert the course of justice could not have been put more stridently. Moses' landmark judgment also produced a score sheet of how all the parties behaved during the SFO investigation. BAE is shown to have tried to use backstairs political muscle to get the police off its back. But this did not succeed. Peter Goldsmith, the attorney general, stood firm against pressure from fellow ministers for a considerable period. Even at the last moment he met Blair and told him it would look terrible to cave in to threats. But he then succumbed to pressure from the then prime minister, and appeared to have agreed to try and sabotage the SFO inquiry by picking holes in its evidence. Wardle himself held out longest of all, but was eventually forced to cave in when Blair raised the stakes. Moses made plain by his words that although Wardle was the nominal defender of the case, the real guilty party in the judicial review dock was not him, but the government. guardian.co.uk © Guardian News and Media Limited 2008 -- Alamaine, IVe Grand Forks, ND, US of A ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ "All are lunatics, but he who can analyze his delusion is called a philosopher." - Ambrose Bierce (1842-1914) "Being ignorant is not such a shame as being unwilling to learn." - Poor Richard's Almanack, 1758 (Benjamin Franklin) ~~~~~~~ In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. 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