Volcker Says Report Is Not An Exoneration
This article is from the archive of The New York Sun before the launch of its new website in 2022. The Sun has neither altered nor updated such articles but will seek to correct any errors, mis-categorizations or other problems introduced during transfer.
UNITED NATIONS – The top U.N. investigator examining the oil-for-food scandal, Paul Volcker, said for the first time during a televised interview that the committee he heads has not exonerated Secretary-General Annan.
The admission came following the resignation of two top investigators for the Independent Inquiry Committee, which hinted at internal disagreements. One of the principals in the committee, Swiss law professor Mark Pieth, yesterday told The New York Sun that no such disagreements exist.
“The committee is always in agreement,” Mr. Pieth, who is one of two lieutenants for Mr. Volcker on the committee, told the Sun. “We all three agreed.” He added, however, that the two investigators who have stepped down from the committee, Robert Parton and Miranda Duncan, might have disagreed with its conclusions.
Mr. Parton told the Associated Press over the weekend that he had not completed his assignment for the committee, as another lieutenant of Mr. Volcker, South African Judge Richard Goldstone, told CNN. Rather, Mr. Parton insisted, he has resigned because of genuine disagreements over content, indicating a soft line toward Mr. Annan. “I resigned my position – not because my work was complete, but on principle,” Mr. Parton said.
In an interview with Fox News’ Eric Shawn, to be broadcast today, Mr. Volcker said of Mr. Annan, “I thought we criticized him rather severely. I would not call that an exoneration.”
After last month’s publication of the second interim Volcker report, two of Mr. Volcker lieutenants, Messrs. Pieth and Goldstone, disputed Mr. Annan’s declaration that the committee has exonerated him. Until now, however, Mr. Volcker himself was quiet about the issue.
In his Fox interview, Mr. Volcker also referred to the fact that both he and a U.N. official mentioned recently in relation to the oil-for-food scandal, Canadian tycoon Maurice Strong, had ties to the Canadian giant Power Corporation.
“I have an acquaintance with Maurice Strong as many people do over the years,” Mr. Volcker told Fox. “I was on the advisory board of the power corporation in 1988, 22 years after Maurice Strong was chief executive. And I asked about it, they had no business interest with Maurice Strong in their whole ownership of the power corporation. It’s a ludicrous stretch. There is no, absolutely no conflict of interest.”
