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Oil-for-Food Scandal

Aired December 3, 2004 - 21:00:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
FRED ECKHARD, U.N. SPOKESMAN: You can't blame the father for the sins of the son.

GEORGE W. BUSH, U.S. PRESIDENT: It's very important for the United Nations to understand that there ought to be a full and fair and open accounting of the Oil For Food Program.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Let the chips fall where they may.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Let the chips fall where they may.

JOHN DANFORTH, U.S. AMB. TO U.N.: Let the chips fall where they may.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

RICHARD ROTH, CNN ANCHOR: Tense times for an increasingly tight- lipped U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan. That was Friday morning at the United Nations. You think you have problems -- welcome to DIPLOMATIC LICENSE. I'm Richard Roth.

Joining me to discuss the woes of Kofi Annan and the curious relationship now with the United States is James Bone of the "Times of London." James has covered three secretaries-general from his U.N. post.

And also with us, Ed Luck, U.N. expert, U.N. consultant and professor and director at the Center on International Organization, Columbia University.

But first I will catch us all up. A senator speaks and the world reacts.

U.S. Senator Norm Coleman said Kofi Annan should step down because of mismanagement over the Oil For Food scandal. His minority party colleague on Coleman's Senate panel looking into Oil For Food disagreed.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: There's no way that we're ever going to get to the bottom of this massive fraud unless the person who has been at the helm during its entire existence, or almost its entire existence, steps back and then allows us to get to the bottom of this and restore credibility to the United Nations.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I haven't heard any voices of any government, including our own, that are calling for Kofi Annan's resignation.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ROTH: The secretary-general you might say got son-burned this week. It turns out the secretary-general's 29-year-old son, Kojo, received money right up until this year for helping a Swiss company, Cotecna.

That company is being investigated for its role in inspecting goods entering Iraq in the Oil For Food relationship. Kojo received money, credit card use and health benefits and was allegedly using his father's name to try to curry favor at international meetings his father attended.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Within the last three days there have been a series of stories, changing in which -- changing what was the secretary- general's first position, that his son was involved with this company but wasn't getting payments at the time Oil For Food was in effect.

Then we find out that he was getting payments until a couple of months ago. Today, as I said, stories about getting $50,000 in consulting fees and also an additional story saying that Kofi's son was traveling with him during times that they were meeting with international leaders and who knows what they were discussing.

KOFI ANNAN, U.N. SECY.-GEN.: Naturally I have warm family relations with my son. But he's in a different field. He's an independent businessman. He's a grown man and I don't get involved with his activities and he doesn't get involved in mine.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ROTH: Well, the furious senator riled up the rest of the world.

More than 50 African countries sent Kofi Annan a letter saying they were disturbed by biased media reports against the United Nations and Annan. The Europeans and others too rallied behind Annan.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I think that his son is his son, and Mr. Secretary-General is he himself. I don't think we have to link these two together.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We have huge respect for the work he has done and he enjoys our support.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: France supports the United Nations, supports (UNINTELLIGIBLE) and we support Kofi Anna.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ROTH: But it's always about the money. The United States is the biggest funder of the United Nations, more than 20 percent, and there is a low cry from the U.S. Congress that it's time once again to turn the tap off.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I can tell you that taxpayers, not just in my district but all across the country, are fed up. We pay a lot of money to the United Nations.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ROTH: Well, where to start. James, the question many people ask me: how much trouble is Kofi Annan really in?

JAMES BONE, "TIMES OF LONDON": Well, I think it's fair to say he's in growing trouble, and it was significant this week that President Bush failed to offer a strong statement of support and instead said that there should be an open investigation of the Oil For Food scandal and the allegations therein.

So that was a very tepid position and a somewhat dangerous signal for Kofi Anna.

ROTH: Ed, what do you think? Kofi Annan, right now?

ED LUCK, COLUMBIA UNIV.: Well, I think he has the support of most of the member states, but I think everyone is sort of waiting to see what the Volcker panel says.

If Paul Volcker, former Federal Reserve Chairman is leading an investigation by the end of January. They're supposed to have their interim report, talking about individuals at the United Nations and what they might have done wrong, including relatives.

So I think until that point in time, we don't really know. There is nothing at this point on the secretary-general per se. I mean, we in the United States know with the White House there is always a sibling, there is always a son or daughter who gets into trouble. That's nothing unusual. That's standard practice.

Now, the question is whether the secretary-general knew more than he did. If he does, then that's a big problem.

ROTH: James, is this being instigated, as some feel, by people who hate the United Nations, hated it before the Iraq War and now can't wait to get at the United Nations, even before the facts are all in?

BONE: Well, Richard, I would say two things about that.

One is obviously there are disturbing facts, so, you know, as journalists we have to pursue the facts.

Secondly, there is also a political agenda by many of those investigating in the United States who were angered by Kofi Annan's opposition to the Iraq War, particularly his extreme incautious statement in a television interview several months ago that the Iraq War is illegal.

It's historically true that the secretary-general of the United Nations cannot directly antagonize one of the Big 5 powers and survive, and unfortunately Kofi, for some reason, has decided rather unwittingly, by making this rather offhand comment on the television, to antagonize the world's only superpower.

ROTH: And the sending of a letter to the president and Britain, watch it going into Falluja.

Ed, does the United Nations understand the gravity of the situation? The senior leaders surrounding Annan?

LUCK: I think they're beginning to, but they have a real bunker mentality. They feel that everyone is out to get them, particularly the Americans, particularly the right-wing press or whatever.

But I think, you know, one should remember that Kofi Annan was the American candidate to be secretary-general.

ROTH: Well, the Clinton administration's candidate.

LUCK: Well, but the Republicans were more than glad to dump Boutros- Ghali as well. It's very hard for the United States to dump Boutros-Ghali and then turn around and dump Kofi Annan. Pretty soon, we'll have no credibility.

BONE: But you have to say that with the American ambassador to the United Nations stepping down in a surprise move this week, the Bush administration has a chance to appoint somebody else. It's going to be very significant how hard-line that person is, the new U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, because one does have a feeling that the second-term Bush administration might try and remake the United Nations in its own image, quite radically.

ROTH: Well, as James has segued us, just when there was a one-minute pause in that Oil For Food drama this week, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations resigned a day or so after returning from Nairobi, where he took the Security Council on a road trip.

John Danforth wrote President Bush to say he wanted out.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DANFORTH: What I really want to do is to go home. I mean, it's just as simple as that. And I wanted to make that clear. In fact, three days after the election I talked to the president's chief of staff, Andy Card, and told him that what we want to do, my wife and I want to do, is to go home. It's not -- it's not that we don't like it here.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ROTH: Of course, he was home just six months ago.

Ed Luck, what happened to John Danforth? Johnny, we hardly knew you.

LUCK: I must say, I was a little surprised. When one of the ambassadors said to me last night he resigned, I thought he meant the secretary-general. I had no idea it would be Danforth.

I guess, you know, if you're only there six months, obviously it wasn't what he expected. Either he has problems with the administration in Washington, which is quite possible -- senators don't like to be told by bureaucrats what to do -- or he's found that the United Nations is a very special club in a different kind of way than the Senate was a special club.

You have to have a lot of patience around the United Nations and it may be that he wanted to get things done a little bit quicker, and that's not unusual for Americans.

ROTH: Danforth did express some frustration on that Friday. His main priority was Sudan.

James, what's the Danforth legacy after such a short period of time?

BONE: Certainly he used to be the American envoy on Sudan and he's made that his priority, to the point of taking the Security Council, as you say, to Nairobi for that extraordinary meeting, the first meeting of the Security Council for 14 years outside of New York, to try and pin down a settlement in southern Sudan and bring more attention to the humanitarian crisis in Darfur.

So I think that's his principle legacy at the United Nations in his short time, and he has done quite a lot on that, although he failed to get a credible threat of sanctions through because the Chinese, who have oil business in Sudan, refused to go along with any sanctions.

ROTH: Danforth was hinted by somebody's list as being a potential replacement for Condoleezza Rice. Ed Luck, who do you think -- it's hard to say -- who could be the Bush administration's pick? Someone right wing? Ambassador Holbrooke, former ambassador, telling me that it's certainly a good indication of which way they want to go, who they chose.

LUCK: I think we have to watch that very carefully, as James said. I mean, if they put someone, let's say, John Bolton, currently undersecretary of state, someone who is very able and knows a lot about the United Nations but is no fan of international law and very abrasive at times, that would be a signal of one sort.

If they pick someone like Rich Williamson, who was rumored before, again, a conservative Republican but someone who believes in the multilateral process in the United Nations, that will be a very different signal. Maybe they'll find someone from Congress (UNINTELLIGIBLE).

ROTH: He was a deputy ambassador.

James, one word, one answer; got any pick?

BONE: No, I don't have. I don't want to tempt fate. I think it's going to be imminent.

ROTH: OK. Well, thank you. You'll stick around, both of you, for more discussion.

At the same moment the news on Danforth broke, President Bush named the former New York City police commissioner Bernard Kerik to lead the Department of Homeland Security. Kerik worked for Rudolph Giuliani, the former New York mayor, who may have higher aspirations four years from now.

Back in May when people were wondering who would get the job Danforth eventually did, Giuliani was asked about taking the United Nations ambassador's post.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

RUDOLPH GIULIANI, FMR. MAYOR OF NEW YORK CITY: I can't think of a man that would be better qualified for what is probably our most critical diplomatic assignment right now. As far as I'm concerned, I'm not looking for a job and I can think of lots of people that would be very well qualified to handle the United Nations. You remember that my relationship with the United Nations consisted of trying to get them to pay parking tickets, so I don't know how that all would work.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

ROTH: It's another United Nations report. Well, some would like this report to be the be all and end all for United Nations reform, more like overhaul. It's the so-called High Level Eminent Persons Working Panel, for about a year at the request of Secretary-General Annan, and he got the report this week.

After 9/11, the Iraq War and the logjam of endless debate over, among other issues, which country should be added to the U.N. Security Council, it was time for some outsiders to weigh in.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: In this world we have to remain, you know, to remain perennial optimists. I personally hope that a very large number of our recommendations will be taken up and will be adopted.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ROTH: Well, we'll see.

Joining me now, Gareth Evans, one of the Panel of Eminent Persons chosen by Kofi Annan to write this report. Mr. Evans was also Australia's foreign minister and is now president of the International Crisis Group, a global think tank.

Still with me to talk about the report, Ed Luck, at the Center on International Organization and over at the United Nations, James Bone of the "Times of London."

OK, Mr. Evans, 101 recommendations. Which one do you think has the highest need to be adopted and what is it?

GARETH EVANS, INTL. CRISIS GROUP: Well, where do you start. Terrorism. Nuclear weapons. Proliferation. Dealing with the problem of failed/failing fragile states. Reconstructing the Security Council. Reforming the secretariat. Making a dysfunctional Human Rights Council --

ROTH: Is that how you felt when they asked you if you wanted to be on this panel?

EVANS: There's a huge number of things that are worth doing, and to pick out one or two of them would completely miss the point. This is an institution which is at a watershed in its history. Multilateral security is at a watershed in its history, after the alarms and diversions and adventures of the last few years.

It's critically important to recover traction for effective global institutions and effective globally applied policies, and what we need to do is address them right across the whole spectrum of 21st century security issues, and you can't just define them as one or two high priority ones. There's many more than that.

ROTH: What does the report say about terrorism? Does it define terrorism, an issue that the General Assembly has not been able to settle on.

EVANS: Well, it does, and that's one of the most important contributions, I think, particularly significant bearing in mind that I had 16 members on this panel, including from the Arab League and many other parts of the world where this issue has been highly contentious. And the bottom line of that definition that we offer with consensus, agreement among ourselves, is that the core issue of terrorism is politically motivated violence against civilians and other noncombatants, and if we can clear the decks on that issue and get agreement about that, there's every chance we'll get much more effective international instruments in place.

ROTH: All right, James Bone, it all sounds good. Question or a comment from you.

BONE: Well, Richard, the thing at the United Nations is that there is the practical world and then there's scripture, and this is really scripture. As scripture, it's quite interesting, it had some quite interesting doctrinal points, particularly on the definition of terrorism, which is a broad definition of terrorism, and excludes resisting foreign occupation as an excuse for blowing up noncombatants.

So that might actually take -- move forward. The trouble is that have you have a divergence between scripture and what actually happens on the ground, you get a lack of credibility and you get charges of hypocrisy, so I fear that there will be some of that in the response to this report.

ROTH: Ed Luck -- let's just get Ed for a second. He threw in a few ideas on this report. I don't know. He says that they weren't really accepted. Ed, go ahead.

LUCK: A few, oddly enough, were.

I mean, I think it's a very good report and a very timely report. But we have to recognize this is not an especially propitious time politically to expect really rapid change and rapid implementation.

But I think the report may help heal some of the divides of north and south by looking at a really comprehensive definition of collective security, that we're all in the same boat. I think it's very important in that sense.

BONE: And, Richard, I'd like to put one other thing to Mr. Evans, which is that he talks about getting the rules on the use of force right. This report was obviously written because people felt that there was a diversion between Britain and the United States and several other countries in the coalition on Iraq and the rest of the world over the use of force.

In fact, all the report has done is restate the rules of the use of force that currently exist. And therefore, I don't think it can claim to have got them right, because there was a problem with them before this report and the same problem remains after this report.

ROTH: All right -- Gareth.

EVANS: Well, to restate the rules with the weight of this particular panel and the unanimity of this particular panel behind it is to advance the debate quite considerably, given that there are lots of people out there who want to rewrite the rules or in fact complain that no rules exist now in a world of real politics and superpower dominance and we don't need rules and we don't have them.

To say that there are rules, they are very clear and they should be observed, is to make an advance. And we also, of course, say a lot about how those rule should be applied and practiced by identifying criteria of legitimacy and so on. You might regard it as scripture, but remember, one bit of scripture, as I recall, is the Acts of the apostles, and this particular report does convey quite a serious program of action.

ROTH: James, the Security Council, unless you want to comment on the scriptures here. Security Council reform. What did this report say? Let's have you say it, James. They didn't really solve in one proposal how the Security Council should be expanded, right?

BONE: I mean, certainly that's one of the interesting proposals.

Mr. Evans says that some of the two rival proposals for Security Council reform each have strong constituencies. The question is whether those two constituencies for the two rival proposals will cancel each other out.

The trouble the trouble at the United Nations is that the constituency against change is almost always bigger than the constituency for change. There are two proposals, as Mr. Evans can probably describe to you better than I can, but one calls for six new permanent members of the Security Council with no new veto plus three new nonpermanent members of the Security Council. And those six would be India, Japan, Germany, Brazil, probably Egypt and one of South Africa or Nigeria.

It's not said in the report that, but that's the assumption among all of the diplomats here.

The second proposal calls for eight what we call semipermanent members who would serve a four-year term rather than the current two-year term, and then one more two-year member.

ROTH: Describe the dynamics into those proposals and what went on and the fights. Were there any good fights on that?

EVANS: Well, the is point that the United Nations has been arguing for the last 15 or 20 years and hasn't been able to reach a consensus about what should go forward to a vote.

What we've done is come up with two self-contained alternative approaches, both of which meet the need for expansion of the Council, to make it more representative and legitimate than the body constructed 60 years ago, and which can be effectively debated and voted up or voted down earlier in the new year.

There was, of course, disagreement on the panel about which people were preferred, reflecting on wider disagreement out there. But the point is, we've identified a way forward which should bring this manner to resolution over the course of the next year.

BONE: If I could say one thing on that -- Richard.

ROTH: Very briefly. I want to get Ed in.

BONE; My understanding of the process is that would require an amendment to the U.N. charter, which itself would require ratification by the United States, which itself would require approval by the U.S. Senate. And I think the Senate is looking at the United Nations -- that's not the U.N. Senate is looking at the United Nations in in a moment.

ROTH: Ed, you've worked on Security Council reform. You've watched it for 10 years plus. Go ahead.

(CROSSTALK)

LUCK: Right. And I worked in the last big effort in '96, '97, put it forward. I mean, I would have been happier if the panel had said nothing about Security Council composition, because I think that's distracting. That's not the biggest point and that's not the major message that they're putting forward.

It matters relatively little who sits around the table. It matters a great deal what the Council actually does in the end. But I think, frankly, they did us a favor by having two proposals instead of one, because I don't think the politics are there right now to move forward on any Security Council expansion. There's too many divisions.

So the fact that these 16 people are divided, we shouldn't be surprised that 191 member states are divided.

ROTH: Gareth, I'd like to give you the last thought. 101 recommendations. Your thoughts as you depart this project on its effectiveness and what do you think we'll see here from this report in the future.

EVANS: I think we'll see a dozen or so of those recommendations taken out and going forward in the leader's summit for the 60th anniversary General Assembly meeting in less than a year's time, and that they will have a high profile.

But a lot of the other recommendations can be dealt with internally by the secretary-general, both others, and in combination as a total package you'll be looking at a fundamentally different international collective security system if any of this is picked up on the scale that the mood around the place shows a willingness to do.

ROTH: There is also a move, let's get some of the younger faces moving up. Get rid of the, quote, "dead wood" in the U.N. secretariat. More on this. We're going to keep talking about this report.

I'd like to thank Gareth Evans, International Crisis Group president, former Australian foreign minister and someone who participated heavily in the writing of this Eminent Persons Report. Thank you very much.

Also here in the studio, on the left there, Ed Luck, thank you, at Columbia University. He thew in his ideas on this report. He's been a frequent guest here and he'll be back again.

And over at the United Nations, from the "Times of London" and our CNN office, James Bone. Thank you -- James.

BONE: Thanks, Richard.

ROTH: Of course the timing of the report couldn't have been more untimely for the U.N. secretary-general. Kofi Annan saw a lot of coverage be detoured to his son and Oil For Food issues this week.

Panel senior researcher Steve Stedman (ph) was asked about the U.N.'s Oil For Food cloud and the effectiveness on this global group, the United Nations.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You don't need Oil For Food to have a sense of urgency about this house. You know, 800,000 people died in a genocide in 1994 and nobody responded, right. You had several members going to war over Iraq with others saying no. There is no consensus whatsoever in the member states regarding what is the proper role of the United Nations in terms of security, what are the threats that we face. None of that.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ECKHARD: Yesterday Peru deposited the 40th ratification for the WHO framework convention on tobacco control, Richard will be glad to hear, which will allow the convention to enter into force in 90 days. The World Health Organization today said that the convention will improve health by contributing to the reduction of tobacco consumption, currently the cause of premature death for nearly 5 million people every year.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ROTH: The U.N. spokesman Fred Eckhard glad to talk about something other than Oil For Food, and we appreciate the thanks, Fred. As more and more countries and towns establish smoking bans and work on world treaties, even if some critics say the treaties are not tough enough for now.

Fuming about the view on smoking? Send us an e-mail. Put the patch on and write to Diplomatic.License@CNN.com. Once again, if you're not too busy coughing, that's Diplomatic.License@CNN.com.

And that is DIPLOMATIC LICENSE. I'm Richard Roth, here in New York. Thanks for watching.

END

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