OMEN
04-04-2006, 10:11 AM
TWO senior federal ministers will face their toughest scrutiny yet over what they knew about AWB's kickbacks to Iraq when they deliver sworn statements to the Cole inquiry tomorrow.
Foreign Minister Alexander Downer and Deputy Prime Minister Mark Vaile were expected to meet tomorrow's deadline of providing statements to the inquiry, with the possibility of them being called as witnesses as early as next week.
The deadline loomed as US politicians urged their trade chief to investigate whether AWB breached American or international trade rules.
Mr Downer today said his statement was still "being worked on" and he did not want to give any details away before the inquiry's lawyers had read it.
"There are people making claims and running lines in the Cole inquiry or one sort or another, I don't think we should all be partisans in that," he said.
"I think in the end we should let commissioner (Terence) Cole make his decisions and judgments, and in the end he will produce a report and let's have a debate on the report that he produces."A spokesman for Mr Vaile said the deputy prime minister was ready to hand in his statement.
"He has to have it in by tomorrow and he has said he will have it in by tomorrow," the spokesman said.
Both ministers have previously said they would be happy to appear at the inquiry.
Lawyers for the inquiry revealed last week that they had asked the ministers for statements outlining what they knew about claims AWB paid nearly $300 million in kickbacks to Saddam Hussein's regime.
Once their statements are received, the inquiry's legal team plus lawyers for AWB and its executives will study them before deciding whether to call them to the witness box.
Meanwhile, the Federal Government has dismissed calls by American politicians for a top-level inquiry into Australia's monopoly wheat export system, which has AWB at its heart.
Five Democrat senators have written to US Trade Representative Rob Portman arguing allegations AWB paid kickbacks to the Iraqi government under the UN's oil-for-food program show the company's willingness to break trade rules.
Labor's foreign affairs spokesman Kevin Rudd described the US complaint as "disturbing", saying it raised the possibility of legal action against AWB in the US.
But Treasurer Peter Costello brushed off the senators' complaint, saying Australia would not abandon its single desk marketing arrangements without huge trade-offs on market access and farm subsidies.
At the Cole inquiry today, a key AWB whistleblower was accused of being a liar, while another executive downplayed his knowledge about kickbacks paid through trucking fees to a Jordanian transport company, Alia, which was part-owned by the Iraqi government.
Former AWB marketing chief Charles Stott's barrister Paul Lacava QC accused former chartering manager Michael Watson of being a witness who had "lied on their oath" for claiming he had told Mr Stott on the first day they met in June 2000 about the kickbacks.
Mr Watson rejected the accusation as incorrect.
AWB account manager Nigel Edmonds-Wilson also told the inquiry he first learned about the trucking fees around May 2001 from his boss Dominic Hogan.
He even drew up his own spreadsheets clearly showing the trucking fees AWB was paying to Alia.
However Mr Edmonds-Wilson insisted he never knew the money was being funnelled from Alia to the Iraqi government, despite having seen several emails and telexes saying Alia passed on the fees to the government-owned Iraqi State Company for Water Transport.
News.au
Foreign Minister Alexander Downer and Deputy Prime Minister Mark Vaile were expected to meet tomorrow's deadline of providing statements to the inquiry, with the possibility of them being called as witnesses as early as next week.
The deadline loomed as US politicians urged their trade chief to investigate whether AWB breached American or international trade rules.
Mr Downer today said his statement was still "being worked on" and he did not want to give any details away before the inquiry's lawyers had read it.
"There are people making claims and running lines in the Cole inquiry or one sort or another, I don't think we should all be partisans in that," he said.
"I think in the end we should let commissioner (Terence) Cole make his decisions and judgments, and in the end he will produce a report and let's have a debate on the report that he produces."A spokesman for Mr Vaile said the deputy prime minister was ready to hand in his statement.
"He has to have it in by tomorrow and he has said he will have it in by tomorrow," the spokesman said.
Both ministers have previously said they would be happy to appear at the inquiry.
Lawyers for the inquiry revealed last week that they had asked the ministers for statements outlining what they knew about claims AWB paid nearly $300 million in kickbacks to Saddam Hussein's regime.
Once their statements are received, the inquiry's legal team plus lawyers for AWB and its executives will study them before deciding whether to call them to the witness box.
Meanwhile, the Federal Government has dismissed calls by American politicians for a top-level inquiry into Australia's monopoly wheat export system, which has AWB at its heart.
Five Democrat senators have written to US Trade Representative Rob Portman arguing allegations AWB paid kickbacks to the Iraqi government under the UN's oil-for-food program show the company's willingness to break trade rules.
Labor's foreign affairs spokesman Kevin Rudd described the US complaint as "disturbing", saying it raised the possibility of legal action against AWB in the US.
But Treasurer Peter Costello brushed off the senators' complaint, saying Australia would not abandon its single desk marketing arrangements without huge trade-offs on market access and farm subsidies.
At the Cole inquiry today, a key AWB whistleblower was accused of being a liar, while another executive downplayed his knowledge about kickbacks paid through trucking fees to a Jordanian transport company, Alia, which was part-owned by the Iraqi government.
Former AWB marketing chief Charles Stott's barrister Paul Lacava QC accused former chartering manager Michael Watson of being a witness who had "lied on their oath" for claiming he had told Mr Stott on the first day they met in June 2000 about the kickbacks.
Mr Watson rejected the accusation as incorrect.
AWB account manager Nigel Edmonds-Wilson also told the inquiry he first learned about the trucking fees around May 2001 from his boss Dominic Hogan.
He even drew up his own spreadsheets clearly showing the trucking fees AWB was paying to Alia.
However Mr Edmonds-Wilson insisted he never knew the money was being funnelled from Alia to the Iraqi government, despite having seen several emails and telexes saying Alia passed on the fees to the government-owned Iraqi State Company for Water Transport.
News.au