UNITED NATIONS, Feb. 4 (UPI) -- The Iraqi ambassador to the United Nations has criticized former U.N. Secretary-General Boutros Boutros-Ghali for his role in the Iraq oil-for-food program.
Ambassador Samir Sumaidaie told reporters Friday at U.N World Headquarters in New York he had serious doubts about the way Boutros-Ghali conducted himself, and that the secretariat under his charge had "bent over backwards to please the Saddam regime."
The Financial Times reported that Paul Volcker, in charge of the inquiry into the oil-for-food scandal, said on UK television Thursday night Boutros-Ghali would be "very central" to the inquiry.
The charges in Volcker's report released earlier Thursday centered on Boutros-Ghali's selection of the French Banque National Paris to hold the oil-for-food escrow account.
"Why should he interfere in the selection of the bank in order to please the Iraqi government at that point?" Sumaidaie said.
U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan told reporters Friday he would not want to "second guess" Boutros-Ghali.
The oil-for-food program came into effect in late 1996 as Boutros-Ghali was about to retire.
