Another Friend of Saddam

November 8, 2005
Wall Street Journal
Original Source: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB113141412773390735.html?mod=opinion&ojcontent=otep

Under ordinary circumstances, the demotion of K. Natwar Singh from India's Foreign Minister to minister-without-portfolio would not attract much attention, at least outside of India. But the circumstances of Mr. Singh's demotion are not ordinary.
Mr. Singh's name appears on a list of people who received lucrative oil vouchers from Saddam Hussein, each voucher usually amounting to several million barrels. The list, originally compiled by Saddam's Oil Ministry and published last month by Paul Volcker's Committee investigating the U.N.'s Oil for Food scandal, also contains the names of British MP George Galloway, French Senator Charles Pasqua, Russian politician Vladimir Zhironovsky and other influential, financially suggestible types known to be well-disposed toward Iraq.
Mr. Singh, who visited Iraq in 2001 as part of an Indian goodwill delegation and who led an effort in the Indian parliament to condemn the invasion of Iraq in 2003, is listed as having gotten a voucher for four million barrels. (Mr. Singh denies the charges.) The list indicates that this voucher was then contracted to an oil-trading company called Masefield, based in Zug, Switzerland. According to a report last summer in BusinessWeek, Masefield is one of dozens of front companies run by Marc Rich, the billionaire oil trader and former American fugitive pardoned by Bill Clinton in one of his last acts as President.
No doubt this incident has embarrassed the government of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, whose Congress Party was also listed as having been granted an allocation of four million barrels (also contracted by Masefield). But it does India's democracy great credit that the Volcker revelations have led to an accountability moment. More such moments will be needed in many other countries if the stain of Oil for Food is ever to be erased.