Kalau 10 tahun yang lalu PBB memanfaatkan "UN's oil-for-food" programme untuk di korup, maka sekarang PBB melihat peluang untuk menjadi Pemburu Harta Karun.
Melalui Organisasi untuk Kerja Sama Ekonomi dan Pembangunan (OECD) akan memburu harta para koruptor kakap, melakukan pengusutan korupsi, mengambil tindakan pencegahan, menemukan, membekukan, dan mengembalikan aset-aset haram. Tentunya semua ini tidak gratis, setelah dipotong segala macam ongkos-ongkos, success fee dsb, mudah-mudahan pengembalian aset secara fisik masih ada yang tersisa ..... http://www.ft.com/cms/s/53c8ab12-86e5-11db-9ad5-0000779e2340.html Iraq's oil-for-food scandal perpetrators go unpunished By Mark Turner at the United Nations, Michael Peel in London and Haig Simonian in Zurich Published: December 8 2006 22:27 Slightly more than a year after a United Nations inquiry discovered a staggering level of graft by officials and corporations worldwide in buying cheap oil and selling goods to Iraq experts warn the great majority of alleged perpetrators are escaping scot-free. An 18-month inquiry by Paul Volcker, former Fed chairman, found that more than 2,000 companies, including some of the world's most reputable blue chips, paid kickbacks to get a piece of the market to sell civilian goods to Iraq, providing the regime of Saddam Hussein with $1.8bn in illicit income. Some legal action stemming from the accusations has generated headlines: in Australia, 11 wheat board officials face possible criminal charges; in France, Christophe de Margerie, chief executive designate of Total is in the spotlight; in India the foreign minister had to step down; and in the US, two influential private oil traders are due to face trial next year. A US court also convicted Tongsun Park, who acted as an agent for Iraq in its efforts to undermine the programme, to help Iraqi civilians. Yet the response in most countries has been negligible. Russia, seen as a powerful source of wrongdoing, all but dismissed the findings as soon as they emerged. Few expected Moscow to do otherwise. But there has also been a similar lack of follow-up even in countries that present themselves as anti-corruption leaders. British authorities, for example, have yet to take action against any of the UK firms named in the report, which included Weir Group, the engineer. The Serious Fraud Office said it was still considering whether to open an investigation, while a new police anti-corruption unit set up to investigate bribery by British companies and individuals overseas said it would probe the case only if instructed to do so by the SFO. "This report has been out for more than 12 months and they are still just thinking about it," said Jeremy Carver, a board member of Transparency International UK, a state of affairs he described as "really shocking". Swiss companies say there has been nearly no follow-up since last year. "We have had no contact from the Swiss or Swedish authorities," says Thomas Schmidt, spokesman for the Swiss-Swedish electrical engineering group. "We are still conducting internal inquiries." Roche, the pharmaceuticals group, similarly said there had been no official contacts, and the dust has settled even at Cotecna, the Geneva-based goods authentication company that hit the headlines after allegations about its involvement with UN Secretary General Kofi Annan's son. "We haven't heard a thing since the fifth and final report came out on October 27 2005," says Alison Bourgeois, head of corporate communications. In Germany, prosecutors have launched initial probes into some of the approximately 60 companies named in the report, but progress has been slow. The Stuttgart prosecutor's office investigating Volcker report allegations against automaker DaimlerChrysler admitted in October "nothing further would happen on the case until January" due to staff shortages. Daimler on Friday reiterated its position that it had not knowingly paid any kickbacks. Mr Annan, whose second term was almost destroyed by the scandal, has sought to focus more attention upon wrongdoing outside his organisation. But he told the Financial Times: "Given the numbers involved, we haven't seen much action across the board." "There's very little specific follow-up. The problem is that legal proceedings find the [oil-for-food] scandal very difficult to deal with," said Jermyn Brooks, head of Transparency International's private-sector programme. "Prosecutors are looking at what happened and saying actually the Iraqi government stole money from itself. Our legal colleagues tell us it is very difficult to fit this into a corrupt-crime category." Only one country, Denmark, regards flouting UN sanctions as a crime. Given limited resources, decisions are being made to focus efforts elsewhere. Politics is also playing a role. "In some cases, sad to say, the political levels might feel this is damaging to national prestige, and prosecutors are dissuaded from giving priorities to those kind of cases," said Mr Brooks. Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2007
