May 10, 2005
Court Favors U.N. on Oil - For - Food Papers
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS 
Filed at 1:46 a.m. ET
UNITED NATIONS (AP) -- A U.S. federal judge granted lawyers for the U.N. oil-for-food probe a temporary restraining order that bars a former investigator from turning over secret documents to a pair of U.S. congressional committees.
Robert Parton quit the Independent Inquiry Committee in April, reportedly because he believed an interim report it had released two weeks before ignored evidence critical of U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan and his role in awarding a contract under the $64 billion program. He took thousands of files with him, possibly violating a confidentiality agreement.
Parton has already turned over documents from the investigation to the House International Relations Committee in response to a subpoena. After he did that, two other congressional investigations sought the same documents and filed subpoenas of their own.
U.S. District Judge Ricardo Urbina in Washington issued the 10-day restraining order Monday to keep Parton from fulfilling those two subpoenas. The United Nations had filed a petition for the freeze on behalf of inquiry chief Paul Volcker, the former U.S. Federal Reserve chairman.
Even so, it was a highly potent, symbolic act, in which the world body brought court proceedings with the express intent of fending off lawmakers from its biggest financial contributor. The United States pays a quarter of the U.N. general budget.
A letter accompanying the petition, from inquiry committee lawyer Susan Ringler, says the documents are covered by United Nations immunity and disclosing them would cause ''irreparable harm'' to the U.N. It argued that witnesses in Volcker's ongoing investigation might not feel their confidentiality would be protected and in some cases might feel their lives could be at risk.
At the same time, the United Nations filed a separate petition asking the court to rule that Parton breached his confidentiality agreement and order him to return any documents from the investigation still in his possession.
Annan appointed the Volcker probe last year to investigate fraud in oil-for-food and set up clear safeguards to make it as independent as possible. But the probe has itself been thrust into the spotlight over accusations that it covered up evidence critical of the U.N. leader.
The oil-for-food program allowed Saddam Hussein's government to sell oil and use the proceeds to buy food, medicine and humanitarian goods during the U.N. trade embargo, but it became a tool with which the Iraqi dictator stole billions of dollars.
In an interim report March 29, Volcker's panel concluded there wasn't enough evidence to prove Annan influenced the awarding of an oil-for-food contract to a Swiss company that employed his son, Kojo Annan.
But it faulted him for not properly investigating allegations of conflict of interest in the awarding of the contract, and Volcker's committee denies it ignored any facts about Annan.
A third report, expected to be the last, is due this summer.
In a statement released through his lawyer Monday, Parton defended his decision to take the documents with him. He said he kept the documents ''because of my concern that the investigative process and conclusions were flawed.''
Parton said he had repeatedly expressed his concerns to the committee and wanted to keep a record that showed he wasn't associated with the conclusions it made.
In another statement Monday prior to the court ruling, Parton's lawyer, Lanny Davis, said Parton would comply with the congressional subpoenas unless the court ordered him not to.
''We trust and expect that if a federal court so orders, the Congress will refrain from seeking to hold Mr. Parton in contempt,'' Davis wrote.