Korean Lobbyist Arrested in US
A Korean lobbyist was recently arrested in Houston on charges related to the UN Oil for Food Program Scandal:
Michael J. Garcia, the United States attorney in Manhattan, announced that Mr. Park was arrested in Houston by F.B.I. agents, but provided no information about how he was found. Mr. Park’s whereabouts had been unknown since he was first indicted on April 14, 2005, for his role in the program.
According to new charges unsealed yesterday, Mr. Park began working with an Iraqi-American businessman, Samir Vincent, as early as 1992 to represent the interests of Saddam Hussein’s government in negotiations at the United Nations to set up the program. Mr. Park and Mr. Vincent met twice in 1993 with a high-ranking United Nations official, the criminal complaint says.
Federal prosecutors charged that Mr. Park had a direct role in influencing the course of the negotiations that created the oil-for-food program in April 1995. The program was set up to alleviate the effects of international sanctions against Iraq by using proceeds from sales of Iraqi oil to buy food, medicine and other supplies for the Iraqi people.
The complaint says that Mr. Park never registered in Washington as a foreign agent. He is charged with acting as an unregistered agent, conspiracy to commit wire fraud and money laundering. He will appear Monday before a federal magistrate in Houston, Mr. Garcia’s office said.
The complaint says that Mr. Park was paid at least $2 million, most of it in cash, by the Iraqi government. Much of the cash was delivered to Mr. Park in New York in Iraqi diplomatic pouches, the complaint says.
All of these people that secretly took money from Saddam at the expense of food and medicine for the Iraqi people are truly scumbags. It is a shame that this is not a bigger story and more heads are not rolling. What I find most interesting about this, is how did a Korean receive a direct role in creating the Oil for Food Program?
