Al-Jazeera says video shows slaying
of British hostage Margaret Hassan
By ROBERT H. REID
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
BAGHDAD, Iraq — Al-Jazeera
television said Tuesday it received
a videotape showing the slaying of
a woman believed to be hostage aid
worker Margaret Hassan. Hassan’s
family in London said they
believed the longtime director of
CARE in Iraq was dead.
The station planned to broadcast
parts of the video later Tuesday.
CARE said in a statement, “It is
with profound sadness that we
have learned of the existence of a
video in which it appears that our
colleague Margaret Hassan has
been killed. ... The whole of CARE
is in mourning.”
The 59-year-old Briton was
abducted in Baghdad on Oct. 19.
Her captors later issued videos
showing her pleading for Britain to
withdraw its troops from Iraq and
calling for the release of female
Iraqi prisoners.
Jihad Bailout, an Al-Jazeera
spokesman, said the station received
the tape a few days ago but had not
been sure of its authenticity.
“We invited British diplomatic
officials to come and view it,” he
said. “It’s now likely that the image
depicts Mrs. Hassan.”
Her four brothers and sisters
said they believe Hassan is dead.
“Our hearts are broken,” they
said in a statement. “We have kept
hoping for as long as we could, but
we now have to accept that
Margaret has probably gone and at
last her suffering has ended.”
The family did not indicate why
they now believed Hass an was dead,
but said: “Those who are guilty of
this atrocious act, and those who
support them, have no excuses.”
On Sunday, U.S. Marines
found the mutilated body of what
they believe was a Western woman
on a street in a Fallujah during the
U.S. assault on the insurgent
stronghold. Besides Hassan, the
only Western woman known held
was Teresa Borcz Khalifa, 54, a
Polish-born longtime resident of
Iraq who was seized last month.
Al-Jazeera reported on Nov. 2
that Hassan’s captors had
threatened to turn her over to
followers of Jordanian militant
Abu Musab al-Zarqawi.
Al-Zarqawi and his men have
been blamed for numerous deadly
car bombings and the slayings of
foreign hostages, including three
Americans and a Briton. More
than 170 foreigners have been
kidnapped in Iraq this year; more
than 30 of them have been slain.
Born in Ireland, Hassan also
held British and Iraqi citizenship.
She lived in Iraq for 30 years and
married an Iraqi.
Her family said: “Nobody can
justify this. Margaret was against
sanctions and the war. To commit
such a crime against anyone is
unforgivable. But we cannot
believe how anybody could do this
to our kind, compassionate sister.
“The gap she leaves will never
be filled.”
Margaret Hassan, the kidnapped director of CARE International in Iraq, appears in
this image made from television in a videotape aired by the Arabic television station
Al-Jazeera on Oct. 22. The family of Hassan, 59, said Tuesday they believed she was
dead.
Officials say Saddam moved money to pay bombers’ families
By DESMOND BUTLER
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
NEW YORK —- Saddam Hussein
diverted money from the U.N. oil-for
food program to pay millions of dollars
to families of Palestinian suicide bombers
who carried out attacks on Israel, say
congressional investigators who
uncovered evidence of the money trail.
The former Iraqi president tapped
secret bank accounts in Jordan — where
he collected bribes from foreign
companies and individuals doing illicit
business under the humanitarian
program — to reward the families up to
$25,000 each, investigators told The
Associated Press.
Documents prepared for a hearing
today by the House International
Relations Committee outline the new
findings about how Saddam funneled
money to the Palestinian families.
Investigators examining the oil-for
food program felt it was “important for us
to determine whether the profits from his
corruption were put toward terrorist
purposes,” committee chairman Henry
Hyde, R-Ill., said of Saddam’s well-known
financial support of suicide bombers.
Today’s hearing, however, will focus
on a French bank that handled most of
the money for the program. An audit by
a U.S. regulatory agency of a small
sample of transactions out of the $60
billion U.N. escrow account managed
by BNP-Paribas has raised serious
questions concerning the bank’s
compliance with U.S. money laundering
laws, investigators said.
“There are indications that the bank
may have been noncompliant in
administering the oil-for-food
program,” Hyde said in his statement to
AP. “If, true these possible banking
lapses may have facilitated Saddam
Hussein’s manipulation and corruption
of the program.”
While acknowledging that U.S.
regulators have raised routine issues with
BNP on compliance with banking laws,
a lawyer for BNP said Hyde’s statement
was unfair.
“No departure from any standard
caused or contributed in any way to the
abuse at the oil-for-food program,” the
bank’s lead council Robert S. Bennett
said. “There are simply no connections.”
The humanitarian program that let
Iraq trade oil for goods was set up in
1996 to help Iraqis get food, medicine
and other items that had been scarce
under strict U.N. economic sanctions
imposed after the Gulf War. But
investigators say Saddam made more
than $21.3 billion in illegal revenue
under the program as well as by evading
the sanctions for more than a decade.
Iraq had thousands of secret bank
accounts throughout the world,
including over 1,500 in Jordan. Money
from kickbacks on oil-for-food deals,
illegal oil payments from the Jordanian
government and other illicit funds were
paid into accounts held by a Jordanian
branch of the Iraqi government-owned
Rafidain Bank, investigators said.
According to employees of the Iraqi
Central Bank and the Rafidain Bank, the
former Iraqi ambassador to Jordan, Sabah
Yassen, withdrew money from the
accounts to make payments ranging from
$15,000 to $25,000 to the families of
Palestinian suicide bombers, Hyde said.
Palestinians have said Saddam paid
more than $35 million to families of
Palestinians killed or wounded in the
conflict with Israel that began in
September 2000. Since then, Palestinians
have carried out 117 suicide bombings,
killing 494 Israelis and others.
Five congressional panels, including
Hyde’s, have been pressing a U.N.
appointed independent inquiry to hand
over internal U.N. documents for their
own oil-for-food probes.
On Tuesday, former Fed chairman
Paul Volcker reiterated his independent
inquiry’s refusal to share documents in a
letter to Sen. Norm Coleman, R-Minn.
and Carl Levin, D-Mich.,
In the current highly charged
atmosphere, Volcker said, the panel
wants to avoid release of “potentially
misleading and incomplete information
that could impair ongoing investigation,
distort public perceptions, and violate
simple concerns of due process.”
At today’s hearing, Hyde’s panel will
question two BNP executives and plans
to transfer documents for a possible
investigation to the House Committee
on Financial Services.
BNP held the sole escrow account
through which all of the more than $60
billion of Iraqi oil revenues generated
through the program flowed while it was
in place from 1996 to 2003.
BNP also wrote letters of credit for
deals for the import of humanitarian
goods which were approved by the
United Nations and paid for out of the
escrow account.
Investigators said evidence from
DENNIS COOK/THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Charles Duelfer, left, author of a CIA report on Iraq’s weapons of
mass destruction, appears before the Senate Governmental Affairs
Permanent Investigations Subcommittee on Capitol Hill on Monday
to discuss how Saddam Hussein abused the U.N. Oil-for-Food
Program. At right is Lt. Col. Stephen Zidek, former procurement
chief of the Iraq Survey Group.
documents subpoenaed from BNP in
July and received from U.S. regulatory
agencies suggests that the French bank —
which has New York offices — failed to
comply with anti-money laundering laws
passed under the U.S. Patriot Act in
2001.
“Evidence seems to indicate that in
some cases, payments in the oil-for-food
program were made by BNP at times
with a lack of full proof of delivery for
goods and other necessary documents
contracted for in the oil-for-food
program,” Hyde said.
The U.N. Security Council approved
all deals under the oil-for-food program.
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