Danish Cos. Charged in Oil-For-Food Probe 

The Associated Press 
March 30, 2006
The Houston Chronicle
Original Source: http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/ap/fn/3759142.html

COPENHAGEN, Denmark — Prosecutors said Thursday they have filed preliminary charges against two Danish companies involved in the U.N.'s tainted oil-for-food program.
The move was a step short of a formal charge, and would allow investigators to extend the probe of engineering company FLSmidth and pharmaceutical group Novo Nordisk A/S by five years, said prosecutor Henning Thiesen.
We are doing this to get past the five-year limit because we do not want the cases to become obsolete, Thiesen said. He said it did not mean that investigators had found new incriminating information against the companies.
Thiesen declined to specify the charges, but FLSmidth said it was suspected of having paid 580,000 kroner (euro77,700; US$94,000) in bribes in connection with five deliveries of spare parts worth a total of 14.5 million kroner (euro1.9 million; US$2.3 million) before the Iraq invasion in 2003.
Novo Nordisk confirmed it too was being investigated but gave no further details. In February, it received a subpoena from the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission ordering it to provide documents relating to the oil-for-food program.
Both companies have denied any wrongdoing.
Twenty-one Danish firms were among more than 2,000 companies and individuals accused in a U.N. report in October of paying kickbacks to Iraqi officials to secure contracts under the oil-for-food program during Saddam Hussein's regime.
The program was launched in 1996 to help Iraqis cope with U.N. sanctions imposed after Saddam's 1990 invasion of Kuwait. It allowed Saddam's regime to sell oil, provided the proceeds went primarily to buy humanitarian goods and pay war reparations.
Saddam allegedly sought to curry favor by giving former government officials, journalists and others vouchers for Iraqi oil that could then be resold at a profit.