Revelations about the U.N. Oil for Food Program get uglier and uglier. Designed to allow Iraq to collect revenues to pay for humanitarian supplies such as food and medicine, it appears to have been manipulated by Baghdad to reward friends of the regime and enrich the country's leadership. The damage has been magnified by allegations of corruption and negligence on the part of the United Nations. There needs to be a complete investigation of what went wrong with the Oil for Food Program, but caution must be taken to ensure that this does not become a witch hunt that needlessly tars the U.N. and settles scores in Iraq.
The Oil for Food Program was the product of the first Persian Gulf War. Stringent conditions were imposed on Baghdad after its army was driven from Kuwait. Failure to comply with the terms of the peace treaty drew international sanctions that exacted a harsh price on ordinary Iraqis. Shrewd manipulation by the Iraqi government turned international opinion against the allied powers, which were blamed for the hardships. To ease the pain, the U.N. authorized the Oil for Food Program in 1995. It went into effect a year later and was shut down late last year. During its lifetime, Iraq exported $69.5 billion of oil; those revenues were used to buy humanitarian supplies.
There were always suspicions that the program was not working as intended. Ordinary Iraqis continued to suffer -- malnutrition and disease were rife -- while Saddam Hussein continued to build ornate and grandiose palaces. After the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq last year, the occupation authorities found evidence of how the program might have been abused. A number of investigations are now under way to ascertain exactly what happened.