Reply #3: WaPo": U.N. Board Cites U.S. Contractor in Iraq [View All]

[maddezmom]

By Colum Lynch
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, December 15, 2004; Page A27

UNITED NATIONS, Dec. 15 -- Pentagon auditors concluded that Kellogg Brown & Root, a subsidiary of Halliburton Co., charged "unsupported" and "overstated costs" in more than $800 million in U.S.-administered projects financed by Iraqi oil revenue, according to a report issued Tuesday by a U.N.-appointed financial oversight board.

The chairman of the International Advisory and Monitoring Board (IAMB), Jean-Pierre Halbwachs, said that it was impossible to determine the extent of alleged overcharges because the figures had been redacted from a series of five Pentagon audits presented to the board last month. But he said that he had agreed to a U.S. proposal to appoint an independent auditor to conduct a "special audit" of all contracts awarded to Kellogg Brown & Root (KBR) and other companies without competitive bidding.


The international board was created by the U.N. Security Council in May 2003 to monitor the U.S.-led coalition's management of Iraq's oil revenue. It had been pressing the Pentagon for months to release the audits of KBR as part of a broad effort to ensure that Iraq's oil revenue has been properly spent. The U.S. company had been awarded at least $1.4 billion from Iraqi revenue to repair the country's oil facilities and to import fuel for domestic uses, according to Halbwachs.

A Pentagon spokeswoman, Lt. Col. Rose-Ann L. Lynch, declined to release an estimate of the overcharges cited in the audit, calling the information "proprietary in nature." She said that the United States and KBR both approved the redacted versions of the audits presented to the IAMB.

more: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A64784-2004Dec14.html