David Irving, family connections , Tongsun Park and Saddam's bribes at the UN - some funny business that no-one wants to resolve

69 year old Historian David Irving and so called holocaust denier, ex Austrian prisoner, has hit the headlines again as the schoolboy japes of the Oxford Union ensure his rights to free speech again.

Another Irving family member was recently in the news. John (Johnny - David Irving's young cousin) was wanted rather urgently in the United States on charges related to the Food for Oil for Saddam and the Texas based Bayoil Co. and funds that found their way into the "Babylon" account in Abu Dhabi.

Dr Irving, a married father of two and City oil, trader from Sherborne St John, near Basingstoke, Hampshire, was wanted on a US warrant (and is on the US No Fly list) ...


The US Warrant from the US Dept of Justice for his extradition stated ....


DAVID N. KELLEY, the United States Attorney for theSouthern District of New York, and JOHN KLOCHAN, the ActingAssistant Director in Charge of the New York Office of theFederal Bureau of Investigation ("FBI"), announced the unsealingtoday of an Indictment against DAVID B. CHALMERS, JR., a Texasbusinessman; two entities in which CHALMERS was the soleshareholder, BAYOIL (USA), INC., an oil company based in Texas,and BAYOIL SUPPLY & TRADING LIMITED, a Bahamian company(collectively, the "BAYOIL COMPANIES"); and two individuals whoworked with CHALMERS to purchase Iraqi oil for the BAYOILCOMPANIES, JOHN IRVING, a British citizen, and LUDMIL DIONISSIEV,a Bulgarian citizen and legal permanent resident of the UnitedStates, currently residing in Houston, Texas. The charges arecontained in a Superseding Indictment filed under seal on April13, 2005, and unsealed today in Manhattan federal court.


However Johnny quietly and successfully fought his extradition on these charges (unlike the Nat West 3) with the help of city firm City firm Clyde & Co, said that his client was innocent and did not wish to be subjected to the unpredictability of the US legal system.
The result was ...

The FBI announced on Friday August 17th 2007 ... (see also US Attorney for plea details) and NYT


Two Businessmen and Two Corporations Plead Guilty to Charges Involving a Scheme to Pay Secret Kickbacks to the Government of Iraqin Connection with the United Nations' Oil-for-Food Program


Michael J. Garcia, the United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York, announced the guilty pleas today of David B. Chalmers, Jr., 53, of Houston, Texas, and two corporations that he operated -- Bayoil (USA), Inc., a Delaware corporation with principal offices in Houston, TX, and Bayoil Supply & Trading Limited, a Bahamian company with principal offices in Nassau, Bahamas (collectively, the "Bayoil Companies"). Chalmers and the Bayoil Companies each pleaded guilty today before United States District Judge Denny Chin to participating in a scheme to pay illegal surcharges to the former Government of Iraq in connection with the purchase of crude oil in the United Nations Oil-for-Food Program between mid-2000 and 2003. Judge Chin also accepted earlier today the guilty plea of Ludmil Dionissiev, 61, of Houston, Texas, to related smuggling charges. Dionissiev worked with Chalmers and the Bayoil Companies during the course of this scheme to purchase Iraqi oil. (Chalmers also agreed to forfeit US$9.1 million in profits. )


Chalmers and the Bayoil Companies each pleaded guilty to participating in a conspiracy to commit wire fraud related to the payment of secret illegal surcharge payments to the former Government of Iraq. Dionissiev pleaded guilty to facilitating the transportation and sale of Iraqi oil in January 2001 despite knowing that an agent of Bayoil (USA), Inc. had promised to pay an unlawful secret surcharge to the Government of Iraq in connection with that oil on behalf of a Russian political figure. According to the indictment, the felony information to which Dionissiev pleaded, and the defendants’ statements during their guilty pleas:


etc....


The defendants are scheduled to be sentenced by Judge Chin on November 19, 2007. Chalmers faces a maximum sentence of 20 years’ imprisonment, as well as millions of dollars in fines and restitution. Chalmers and the Bayoil Companies also agreed to forfeit a total of $9,016,151.40, which this Office will seek to transfer to the Development Fund of Iraq (established on May 21, 2003, by United Nations Security Council Resolution 1483) as restitution for the benefit of the people of Iraq. Dionissiev faces a maximum sentence of twenty years’ imprisonment as well as a fine of $250,000.


There is as yet no trace of their penalty.

PS : Judge Chin sentenced South Korean lobbyist Tongsun Park to five years in prison in February 2007 for money-laundering and acting as an unregistered foreign agent for Iraq in the U.N. oil-for-food scandal.

The web of conspiracy and cash that trial witnesses described to the jury in Park's trial was straight from a spy novel (he is said to be a KCIA agent) , in a tale that included cash in envelopes in Manhattan, cash in shopping bags near Washington, cash picked up in Baghdad, deposited in a Jordanian bank and then delivered in the form of checks to various parties, including one of Kofi Annan’s top advisers and environmental gurus, Maurice Strong .

Saddam’s regime paid Park more than $2.5 million for his efforts in conspiring to bribe a UN official.

Which leaves an important mystery. Exactly what — or who — did Saddam and his henchmen think they were getting for their $2.5 million or more in payments to Tongsun Park? No one at the UN has been accused of taking any bribes via Tongsun Park. The theory among such folks as Volcker’s investigators seems to be that despite Park’s efforts in a conspiracy that went on for years, and despite Park’s receipt of millions from Baghdad for his services, somehow no one at the UN ever took the bribes Park was paid to deliver.

Saddam’s regime was massively corrupt, it did not throw money around without expecting some performance in return. And the period most of interest, 1996-1997, was a time at which Saddam was scrimping for cash — Iraq was under sanctions, but the torrent of Oil-for-Food kickbacks, payoffs and smuggling had not yet seriously begun.

Tongsun Park receive no one lump sum for efforts. Payments from Baghdad, spread out over at least two years. Why ? If Park was somehow failing to actually deliver bribes to the UN, Saddam’s regime would have continued forking over the cash.

Witnesses at Park’s trial testified that in 1996, while the UN under Boutros Boutros-Ghali was setting up Oil-for-Food, Park received stacks of Iraqi cash delivered to him in the U.S. But in 1997, which was after Oil-for-Food had begun, but while it was being further shaped during Kofi Annan’s first year as UN Secretary-General, Park on two separate occasions, in July and September of 1997, received two more big payouts from Baghdad.

The first, for about $1 million, was deposited by an Iraqi in July, 1997 into the Jordanian bank account from which Park the following week delivered a check for $988,885 to Maurice Strong (Strong told investigators he did not know the source of the funds, (Ho.Ho.Ho.) and that Park was handing over funds to invest in a Strong family company).

Then there was a second big Baghdad payout, in which Park himself, according to a witness at his trial, walked into the same Jordanian bank in September, 1997 with a bag containing $700,000 in cash and deposited the bundle.

Later that same day, Park drew down almost the entire account to issue a number of checks, including several for businesses in which he had an interest, and one for $30,000 to M. Strong. What became of that check has not been explained.

Tongsun Park, to whom Baghdad paid more than $2.5 million for his role in a conspiracy to convey bribes to the UN, is now kicking his heels in the slammer for 5 long years. We can be grateful to the U.S. system of justice that this much has been done.

But one might have supposed that given all Park’s efforts, worth millions to Baghdad in bagman fees alone, there would have been someone at the UN on the receiving end.

But no one, not one person, has been named.