Ouch! Another embarassing memo.

[Mycroft]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,2763,1506782,00.html

Annan faces new claims in oil-for-food scandal

Julian Borger in Washington
Wednesday June 15, 2005
The Guardian

The future of the UN secretary general, Kofi Annan, was once more in question yesterday after a commission of inquiry revealed it was "urgently reviewing" a newly disclosed document that cast fresh light on Mr Annan's role in the "oil-for-food" corruption scandal.

The document is a memo from Michael Wilson, the vice-president of Cotecna Inspection SA, which employed Mr Annan's son Kojo.

In the memo to his colleagues Mr Wilson mentions contacts with Mr Annan "and his entourage" in Paris in 1998, and claims that Cotecna "could count on their support" for its bid on the $10m (£5.5m) contract to help implement the oil-for-food humanitarian programme.

When the electronic age is fully upon us, there won't be any of these embarassing pieces of paper to haunt us.

[TragicMonkey]

Originally posted by Mycroft
When the electronic age is fully upon us, there won't be any of these embarassing pieces of paper to haunt us.

On the contrary, there will be more and more scandals, as the damaging memos can (and will be) transmitted to dozens of people at once with the click of a button. For one example, the recent Boeing/Air Force corrupt dealing scandal centered around emails. All it would take is one peeved employee or one mistyped email address for all sorts of damaging information to be disseminated from corporations and government. Or even a programming error, say an archiving system that accidentally resends everything past a certain age. And wouldn't it be funny if more people realized that computers don't really "delete" things, but instead just shift the memory around?

I think the information technology age is a whole new basket of monkeys.

[Renfield]

Originally posted by TragicMonkey
On the contrary, there will be more and more scandals, as the damaging memos can (and will be) transmitted to dozens of people at once with the click of a button.

A few years ago, a book was published of e-mails that were salvaged from computers that were used by high ranking officials in the Reagan administration. They were, to say the least, very incriminating. So I guess what you are talking about there has already started happening. In the future, I'm guessing the crooks who run this country will be smart enough to hire experts to help them cover their electonic tracks.

[Bjorn]

New York Times today:

The contractor executive in the United Nations oil-for-food program who claimed in a 1998 memo that Secretary General Kofi Annan supported an award to the company where his son Kojo worked now denies ever talking about the bid with Mr. Annan.

In a statement issued by his lawyers, the executive, Michael R. Wilson, said Wednesday that he "never met or had any discussion with the United Nations secretary general, Kofi Annan, on the issue of the bid for the U.N. contract," not "during the bidding process or at any time prior to the award of the contract."

...............

This is not the first time that Mr. Wilson has recanted a statement involving the secretary general and his son.Not the most reliable guy?

[Drooper]

...and...

Wilson, a long time family friend of the Annans...

The Irish Times June 17.

[Atlas]

Originally posted by Bjorn
New York Times today:
The contractor executive in the United Nations oil-for-food program who claimed in a 1998 memo that Secretary General Kofi Annan supported an award to the company where his son Kojo worked now denies ever talking about the bid with Mr. Annan.

In a statement issued by his lawyers, the executive, Michael R. Wilson...
Not the most reliable guy? Hey Bjorn,

Did the Times mention that Wilson's lawyers also, in fact, represent Kojo. I'm sure they'll be able to present a unified version of truth in this matter.