World's biggest bribe scandal

[zwielicht]

Source: The Age

The company that bribed the world

It was the company with jet-set style and dirty hands. From the tiny principality of Monaco, Unaoil reached across the globe to pay multi-million dollar bribes in oil rich states. The beneficiaries? Some of the biggest companies in England, Europe, America and Australia.

Police launch joint global investigation

The biggest leak of documents in oil-industry history has exposed Monaco-based company Unaoil as an agent of serious corruption. Now, law enforcement groups around the world, including the FBI, are taking notice.

Read more: http://www.theage.com.au/interactive/2016/the-bribe-factory/

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This story, based on a leak of thousands of emails and a half year long investigation by Fairfax and HuffPo, was first released yesterday and updated with part 2 a few hours ago.

[dorkzilla]

1. Will be really interesting to see who gets caught in this net

How many crooked politicians and CEOs will face charges? If history is any indicator, it will be some lower-level schlub who lacks the protection necessary to sidestep justice.

[closeupready]

6. Usually, the secretary gets hard time in prison; her boss, a fine, misdemeanor charges,

and, in the worst cases, probation.

[ChairmanAgnostic]

2. Are you telling me that Huff 'n Puff broke a story?

That's news, too.

I wonder what connections the Clinton Foundation has with these folks.

[Wilms]

3. That's a good question.

After just a few months, Chayes noticed people she thought of as moderate, normal folks expressing sympathy for the Taliban. She soon realized what was happening: the corruption that had been rampant at all levels since the U.S. invasion was fueling anger and unrest.

Chayes later began working for the U.S. military in Afghanistan, waging an internal war to persuade policymakers to focus on corruption. The issue ultimately reached the desk of Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, who largely dismissed it in a 2010 memo that remains classified.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/unaoil-bribery-scandal-corruption_us_56fa2b06e4b014d3fe2408b9

[Fuddnik]

13. I read Sarah Chayes book, "Thieves of State" last year.

She talked to a former Police Sargent who said if he saw Taliban setting up a booby trap for police, he wouldn't warn anyone.

They're so corrupt, and they shake down everyone. And they're all protected from the Presidents office, all the way down. A top-down organized crime syndicate.

[tk2kewl]

4. At least one recorded contribution to Hillary from Unaoil is found here:

http://docquery.fec.gov/pres/2007/Q3/C00431569/A_EMPLOYER_C00431569.html

[packman]

5. Bribery-corruption-oil-

Sort of like the sun coming up in the East, isn't it? I mean, come on - everyone sorta knows but nudge, nudge, wink, wink.

[Yallow]

7. Don't Worry Folks

Zero fat cat executives who knew bribes were being paid will be punished.

They only put poor people in the slammer.

Laws are only for the powerless.

Now bring my yacht around.

[valerief]

11. Yep, laws are made ONLY to protect the wealthy. nt

[Yallow]

8. Remember Oil For Food Kickbacks? Funding Saddam's Regime?

Zero people went to jail then too.

Bribing corrupt scumbags is how we cause political unrest, so we can have wars!!!!

War is great for the bottom line right folks?

[Yallow]

9. Corporate Insulation....

GE is of course above the law.

Fines, fines, and more fines.

Zero prosecutions.

http://www.dailyfinance.com/2010/07/27/ge-settles-kickback-allegations-in-oil-for-food-program-with-sec/

[zwielicht]

12. So far no western news agency has dared to touch this

The journalists who got this story out deserve a lot of respect, some background about how hard it must have been:

How bribe factory Unaoil tried to stop us telling their secrets

How I Exposed A Corporate Bribery Scandal Involving The Biggest Names In The Oil Business

[zwielicht]

15. AP just broke the silence

http://bigstory.ap.org/article/1adf90ba842c4b2a94be9d954cc1fcae/monaco-says-its-investigating-vast-corruption-scandal

[mrdmk]

14. Unaoil’s Huge New Corporate Bribery Scandal, Explained

Unaoil and its subcontractors bribed foreign officials to help major multinational corporations win contracts, tens of thousands of the company’s internal documents show. The investigation illustrates just how complicit big Western companies are in corruption overseas. It also shows that by enabling corruption, these companies fuel the kind of political instability that allows insurgencies like the self-described Islamic State to grow.

It’s a complicated story, so we’re explaining it all for you here.

What is Unaoil?

Unaoil says that it provides international clients with “industrial solutions to the energy sector in the Middle East, Central Asia and Africa.” Its business is “very basic,” founder Ata Ahsani said. “What we do is integrate western technology with local capability.” But the emails suggest that Unaoil’s business plan was far more complicated.

Who’s in charge?

Unaoil is controlled by the wealthy Ahsani family of Monaco. Its patriarch, Ata Ahsani, was in the engineering business in Iran before the 1979 revolution. Like many secular and relatively wealthy Iranians, he left to establish a life in the West. By 1991, he had set up Unaoil. Today, he is its chairman. The CEO is his son Cyrus, a noted Monaco socialite who serves as treasurer of the small nation-state’s Ambassadors Club, whose honorary president is Prince Albert II. Saman Ahsani, Cyrus’ brother, is Unaoil’s COO and a prominent figure in London’s Iranian expatriate community.

Which companies worked with Unaoil?

American companies Halliburton, Honeywell, KBR and FMC Technologies; Korean manufacturers Samsung and Hyundai; U.K.-based Rolls-Royce; and Germany-based Man Turbo all worked with Unaoil, according to internal documents. So did hundreds of other firms, according to an internal Unaoil spreadsheet.

link with more info: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/unaoil-scandal-explained_us_56fbd2f0e4b0daf53aee0cff?jxnbff762pmwbfbt9