The U.N. Security Council will receive on Wednesday a definitive investigative report on its mismanaged oil- for-food scheme, which provided food and medicine to Iraqis under U.N. sanctions from 1996 to 2003, reported dpa. The 15-nation council planned to hold an open meeting to receive the report from an independent inquiry headed by former U.S. Federal Reserve Board chairman Paul Volcker, U.N. spokesman Stephane Dujarric said Tuesday. Volcker's fourth and apparently final report deals with how countries sitting on the council influenced the implementation of the huge relief programme, which ended after U.S. troops invaded Iraq in March 2003. The council created the oil-for-food program in 1995 to reduce suffering by Iraqis who were under U.N. economic sanctions imposed after Iraq invaded Kuwait in August 1990. The Iraqi regime under Saddam Hussein sold more than 64 billion dollars in oil under that programme, but profits were used by the U.N. to buy food and medicine for the civilian population. Volcker's previous reports charged the head of the programme, Benon Sevan of Cyprus, and a Russian national who headed a procurement department, Alexander Yakovlev, with corruption. Yakovlev, who was arrested by U.S. authorities in August, pleaded guilty on charges of pocketing 1.3 million dollars in bribes. --SP 0044 Local Time 2144 GMT
