Halliburton lops $9 million off disputed Iraq pact (Reuters)

(That's Million with an "M" not a "B." Gosh, won't this hurt Halliburton?)

Halliburton lops $9 million off disputed Iraq pact

Mon Jan 30, 2006 07:30 PM ET

By Irwin Arieff

UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - Halliburton Co. subsidiary KBR has agreed to lop $9 million off sole-source contracts paid for by the U.S. government with Iraqi oil money after auditors questioned $208 million in possible overcharges, an international watchdog agency said on Monday.

The International Advisory and Monitoring Board (IAMB), which had urged the U.S. government to reimburse Iraq for any charges that could not be justified, now hopes to independently review the deal to ensure it was fair, the IAMB said in a statement posted on its Web site <http://www.iamb.info>. The board, which said it only recently learned of the December 22, 2005, settlement between the Pentagon and KBR, also hopes to review other sole-source contracts the United States awarded Halliburton while administering Iraq after its 2003 invasion.

The independent review would aim to "determine whether excess costs were incurred that would be the subject of renegotiation," it said. The contracts were part of $1.4 billion in pacts awarded to KBR on a noncompetitive basis to procure supplies of fuel while Washington administered Iraq. Halliburton was led by Dick Cheney before he became vice president.

Rather than pay Iraq the $9 million, the Pentagon chose to take that much off the amount the United States owed KBR for other work in Iraq, an IAMB board member said. "It appears to us that this amount is relatively small," said Bert Keuppens, the IMF representative on the IAMB, referring to the $9 million settlement.

(more at link below)

<http://go.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=domesticNews&storyID=11028550&src=rss/domesticNews>

:kick:

Aren't we glad the Pentagon is taking such good care to protect taxpayers hard earned money is not being spent fraudulently.

What was the size of the Oil for Food scandal $ allegedly looted that John Bolton uses as the excuse for attempting to Bully the UN out of existence? Aren't the admitted losses of $ to fraud through the CPA and also through fraud ala Halliburton starting to outshadow the sum of the Oil for Food scandal which the rw hot heads spew on and on about?

This $9 Million is just a misplaced decimal point to these jerks.

Audit: U.S. lost track of $9 billion in Iraq funds

Pentagon, Bremer dispute inspector general's report

Monday, January 31, 2005 Posted: 0412 GMT (1212 HKT)

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Nearly $9 billion of money spent on Iraqi reconstruction is unaccounted for because of inefficiencies and bad management, according to a watchdog report published Sunday. An inspector general's report said the U.S.-led administration that ran Iraq until June 2004 is unable to account for the funds.

"Severe inefficiencies and poor management" by the Coalition Provisional Authority has left auditors with no guarantee the money was properly used," the report said. "The CPA did not establish or implement sufficient managerial, financial and contractual controls to ensure that funds were used in a transparent manner," said Stuart W. Bowen Jr., director of the Office of the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction.

The $8.8 billion was reported to have been spent on salaries, operating and capital expenditures, and reconstruction projects between October 2003 and June 2004, Bowen's report concluded. The money came from revenues from the United Nations' former oil-for-food program, oil sales and seized assets -- all Iraqi money. The audit did not examine the use of U.S. funds appropriated for reconstruction. (Full story)

Auditors were unable to verify that the Iraqi money was spent for its intended purpose. In one case, they raised the possibility that thousands of "ghost employees" were on an unnamed ministry's payroll. "CPA staff identified at one ministry that although 8,206 guards were on the payroll, only 602 guards could be validated," the audit report states. "Consequently, there was no assurance funds were not provided for ghost employees."

(more at link below)

<http://edition.cnn.com/2005/WORLD/meast/01/30/iraq.audit/>

of fiscal responsibility?

Thanks for the flashback.