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Annan in the firing line from inquiry into oil scandal before UN summit

Diplomatic Editor,Anne Penketh
Thursday 07 July 2005 00:00 BST
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The report, by a panel headed by Paul Volcker, a former chairman of the US Federal Reserve, is expected to land on Mr Annan's desk in mid-August, with its final conclusions on the role of governments in the scandal to be published in October. The timing of the report means that the UN summit in September, which Mr Annan had hoped would focus on development goals, could be overshadowed by fresh speculation about his future.

Mr Annan has been under investigation in connection with the role of his son, Kojo, in the scandal. Kojo worked for the Swiss firm Cotecna, which monitored the implementation of the oil-for-food scheme. The programme, which ran from 1996-2003, allowed Iraq to export limited quantities of oil while under economic sanctions in order to pay for food and medicine.

In March, the Volcker investigation concluded that there was no evidence that Mr Annan steered millions of dollars in UN business in Iraq to Cotecna, which paid his son $485,000 (£276,000).

But since then a former member of the Volcker panel has submitted documents relating to Mr Annan to a US Congressional committee looking into the scandal in which Saddam Hussein bribed officials by skimming money from the scheme and siphoned off more than $2bn in kickbacks to companies.

Asked whether Mr Annan's future depended on the Volcker report, his chief of staff, Mark Malloch Brown, said: "It is his intention to stay on to the end of his term. He is convinced of his innocence and doesn't think Volcker [report] would undermine that."

Mr Malloch Brown said that the summit in New York ought to set the stage for a smooth handover to Mr Annan's successor in 18 months' time. He insisted that the secretary general did not want to be "hounded out of office".

But other UN officials say that the anti-Annan campaign in Washington is worse than that orchestrated by former president Bill Clinton's administration, which prevented Boutros Boutros-Ghali from serving a second term.

Many at the UN presume that it is the turn of an Asian to follow Mr Annan as UN chief. Two candidates have so far thrown their hat into the ring: the Thai Foreign Minister, Kantathi Suphamongkhon; and Sri Lanka's Jayantha Dhanapala, a former UN under-secretary for disarmament.

But Mr Clinton's name has also been mentioned. "I like him out there as a stalking horse because he sets the bar a lot higher," said one UN official.

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