UNSCAM UPDATE: Here’s still more on the oil-for-food scandal:

At least $1.1 billion was paid directly into UN coffers, supposedly to cover the cost of administering the $67 billion scheme, while Saddam Hussein diverted funds intended for the poor and sick of Iraq to bribe foreign governments and prominent overseas supporters of his regime. . . .

Although the UN Security Council approved the plan to levy a 2.2 per cent commission on each oil-for-food transaction, the huge sums this reaped for the UN have never been fully accounted for.

A senior UN official who is closely involved in uncovering evidence of the scandal admitted: “The UN was not doing this work just for the good of Iraq. Cash from Saddam’s government was keeping the UN going for a few years.

“No one knows exactly what sums were involved because an audit has never been done. That is why they are wriggling and squirming now in New York.”

(Emphasis added.) This explains a lot.