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Full powers for panel probing Volcker report

     New Delhi: The Centre on Thursday said it would give "necessary powers" to authorities for probing whether External Affairs Minister Natwar Singh or the ruling Congress Party received favours from Saddam Hussein as stated in the Volcker Report. India's Cabinet on Thursday approved the appointment of a retired Supreme Court Justice RS Pathak for investigation into the UN report led by former US Federal Reserve Chairman Paul Volcker. Volcker had in his report said, that politicians in several nations were given oil vouchers that could be sold for a commission to help the former Iraqi dictator in his attempts to get sanctions lifted. "The Cabinet has approved the proposal to set up the Justice RS Pathak enquiry authority. It will be led by Justice RS Pathak, retired Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of India and retired former judge of the International Court of Justice. The authority will enquire into certain matters arising out of the Volcker Committee report, the authority will be clothed with necessary statutory powers as desired by the authority," said Union Finance Minister P Chidambaram told in his brief on the Union Cabinet's discussions in New Delhi.

    A former UN official from India, Virendra Dayal, has also been roped into as a special envoy of the government of India to liase with the UN and its member states to gather relevant materials regarding the involvement of Indian entities and individuals. The Congress-led government has since the report became public, been battling furious protests by opposition parties, which had accused it of harbouring corrupt politicians, and was forced to order the probe and remove Singh as External Affairs Minister, though the leader was retained in the Cabinet. The opposition parties, led by the BJP, have however, termed the investigation an eyewash, and said that the leader's continuance, as a Union Minister would only cloud the proceedings. Both Natwar Singh and Congress were named in the report. Singh, who has been the first political casualty of the explosive report, has termed the allegations as "outrageous". The oil-for-food program, which began in 1996 and ended in 2003, aimed to ease the impact on ordinary Iraqis of U.N. sanctions, imposed when Iraqi troops invaded Kuwait in 1990. Under the scheme, Iraq was allowed to sell oil to buy food, medicine and many other goods. The UN report said that some 2,200 companies made illicit payments totalling 1.8 billion dollars to Saddam's government under the programme.