Today’s Wall Street Journal has a piece Kojo’s Iraq Connections with more on Kojo Annan and Pierre Mouselli reported here earlier.
UPDATE: For those interested, the Volcker Committee report will be posted here at noon.
MORE: There is a post now up on Instapundit, linking to TigerHawk, about the Wall Street Journal not crediting this blog on the above story. TH wonders (politely) whether I might have had the Journal’s help in the story. To the contrary. This information came to me first and I brought Claudia Rosett into the loop because of her great knowledge and credibility on Oil-for-Food. The WSJ article this morning was not by Claudia who was in transit from Beirut while it was being written. Whoever wrote that story (it is unsigned) contacted Mouselli after reading my report and decided, for whatever reasons, not to credit this blog.
MORE: Some early report info from the AP:
Investigators of the U.N. oil-for-food program in Iraq said Tuesday there was not enough evidence to show that Secretary-General Kofi Annan knew of a contract bid by his son’s employer.
The conclusion in the investigators’ report was not the clear vindication that the secretary-general had wanted.
MEANWHILE: You will be relieved to know “France backs Annan ahead of crucial report“.
MORE: I have been informed that Mouselli has been interviewed by Fox News and should be appearing in the next hours.
CORRECTION OR AMPLFICATION: I have email from Bret Stephens at the WSJ that their Mouselli opinion piece came from Mouselli’s attorney, Adrian Gonzalez, calling them, and was not inspired by this blog. Frankly, I am pleased to hear that since the WSJ has been one of the few major dailies that are not normally threatened by blogs and acknowledge them.
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9 Comments
1. Jamie Irons:One can only wonder what Cotecna had done to merit blacklisting by a country as corrupt as Nigeria!
Great work, Roger!
Jamie Irons
Mar 29, 2005 - 6:55 am 2. Peg C.:Roger, outstanding work. And Instapundit is pointing to Tigerhawk’s post basically stating that the WSJ has copied your work without crediting you. I like the WSJ but that’s slimy MSM behavior if true.
Please stay on the story.
Mar 29, 2005 - 7:58 am 3. Knucklehead:Jamie,
One can only wonder what Cotecna had done to merit blacklisting by a country as corrupt as Nigeria!
I don’t want to sound as if I’m defending KoJo, KoFi (is he any relation to WiFi?), or Cotecna, but it’s probably easier to get blacklisted by a corrupt governmore ment than by a less corrupt one. A government that takes action to try and resist corruption will generally have some mechanism in place to try and avoid things like blacklists. A Cotecna would have to behave corruptly, most likely. A corrupt regime, on the other hand, might blacklist a company for not engaging in corruption, not engaging in sufficient corruption relative to its competitors, engaging in corruption with the wrong corrupt people, or any number of things. Just sayin’, it ain’t like its ‘portant or anythin’.
Mar 29, 2005 - 9:26 am 4. Hovig:Roger,
I saw you on CNBC yesterday, and from your words I got the sense you had posted your story on Rosett’s behalf, i.e., you were in contact with her, and posted it to your blog because she was in transit and unavailable. I may have gotten the facts wrong, but the upshot of what I seemed to hear during your appearance was that you were acting as a proxy for Ms Rosett. I’m sorry if I got the wrong impression, but all I’m trying to say here is, if someone else saw that show, they may have gotten the same impression. If someone has a transcript, I’d be interested to see how I came to this conclusion. Sorry if it was the wrong one.
Mar 29, 2005 - 9:57 am 5. PeterUK:If Kojo Annan had another name,Dick Cheney perhaps,what would be the reaction to him as a 23 year old getting a job in a firm that coincidentally got a huge contract from the UN,bearing in mind his father is the Secretary General?
Mar 29, 2005 - 10:11 am 6. Roger:Hovig, does it make sense I would post something FOR Claudia Rosett. She could publish it herself in the WSJ. This blog may be relatively popular, but nothing like that.
Mar 29, 2005 - 10:11 am 7. Hovig:Roger,
It doesn’t make too much sense, no, which is why in retrospect I’m apologizing. It’s just that, when I heard you speaking yesterday, for some reason I got that impression. How the hell do I know how newspapers work. Probably as much idea as a lot of people have about how computers work.
Mar 29, 2005 - 10:30 am 8. Fausta:You will be relieved to know “France backs Annan ahead of crucial report”.
Imagine that!
Japan, on the other hand, didn’t back France:
If Chirac thought he was going to be welcomed with open arms in Tokyo, he was quickly disabused when he met Japanese prime minister Junichiro Koizumi on Sunday.
In fact, Koizumi, leader of a nation renowned for its diplomatic protocols, was uncharacteristically blunt, telling l’escroc that Japan strongly opposed the lifting of a EU embargo on arms sales to China.
On another issue of contention, the siting of the proposed International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor (ITER) project, Koizumi also refused to yield to the French bully, telling him equally bluntly that Japan would not give up its bid to host the site.
As Reynolds says, Heh.
Mar 29, 2005 - 11:06 am 9. Knucklehead:Fausta,
I’m really becoming a fan of Japan. They could be a wonderful ally if the decide it’s time to stand up and bump elbows with the big boys in international affairs.
What are the chances that Japan and the US could influence countries like the Phillipines, Indonesia, and Malaysia to join the 21st century in terms of politics and economic development? Are the WWII era hatreds still too strong for that sort of thing? I’m wondering what sort of Asian Allies Consortium would be necessary to keep China in check, say, 30 or 40 years from now (not that I’ll be around to see it).
Mar 29, 2005 - 12:36 pm