Dr Burhan Mahmoud Al-Chalabi

20 April 2006

Q80  Sir Philip Mawer: Could I ask, was it Mr Amin who suggested Fortum as a potential company you might approach and from whom you might gain assistance in relation to the mounting of the humanitarian flight?

Dr Al-Chalabi: No.

Q81  Sir Philip Mawer: Do you remember where the suggestion of Fortum came from in that context?

Dr Al-Chalabi: I knew a trader who I contacted. He was working for another company and he said to me, "I am working for Fortum."

Q82  Sir Philip Mawer: What is the name of that trader?

Dr Al-Chalabi: I cannot remember, honestly. It was somebody, whatever he was doing or whatever, and then I went to see him.

Mr Al-Mukhtar: The name of the person.

Dr Al-Chalabi: Oh—Rodney Gavshon.

Q83  Sir Philip Mawer: The one who….?

Mr Al-Mukhtar: His name was mentioned.

Q84  Sir Philip Mawer: He was the trader?

Dr Al-Chalabi: Rodney Gavshon, yes.

Q85  Sir Philip Mawer: He is mentioned in the reports.

Dr Al-Chalabi: Yes.

Q86  Sir Philip Mawer: Thank you. Can I ask a little bit now about your relationship with the Mariam appeal? You have said yourself, it is in your letter to me of 10 February, that you made some donations to the Mariam appeal in the early part of 2000. I think your letter specifically says, "I can confirm that in January or February 2000, and in accordance with my humanitarian principles, I contributed to the Mariam appeal."

Dr Al-Chalabi: Yes.

Q87  Sir Philip Mawer: Could you tell me how much you contributed?

Dr Al-Chalabi: One of the ideas for raising funds for the mercy flight was to offer vouchers to the would-be participants in the flight and to ask for contributions for that voucher, and the contribution—the recommendation was that £500 would be okay; more would be most welcome. I made a contribution of £1,000 for the voucher. When the flight was cancelled it was decided that all the money should be sent back to the people who had given money. I decided not to take my money back and that was my only contribution to Mariam.

Q88  Sir Philip Mawer: So your only contribution was £1,000?

Dr Al-Chalabi: £1,000, which was the voucher.

Q89  Sir Philip Mawer: Which was a voucher in connection with the planned flight?

Dr Al-Chalabi: The mercy flight.

Q90  Sir Philip Mawer: And, following the cancellation of the humanitarian flight, you did not remove your money?

Dr Al-Chalabi: Yes.

Q91  Sir Philip Mawer: You will know that the Senate and UN reports suggest that, following receipt of commission payments from Fortum in connection with the oil contracts, for which you have acknowledged you were agent, donations were made, or transfers were made to people who were connected with the Mariam appeal. Specifically it is alleged in those reports that in the summer of 2000, in July 2000, there was a transfer from a company called Delta Services, which I understand that at the time you owned, to the account of Fawaz Zureikat in Jordan, and it is also alleged in the Volcker report that, following each stage of commission payments to you by Fortum, payments were made to Amineh Abu-Zayyad which in total amounted to some £120,000. I wondered if you could explain to me the circumstances of those payments.

Dr Al-Chalabi: Can I talk about Zureikat first?

Q92  Sir Philip Mawer: Please.

Dr Al-Chalabi: In the Zureikat matter I had no role to play whatsoever. It was a commission given to Zureikat and the oil company, and the oil company asked for my help to transfer the commission for him. That is the only thing I did. I said yes, because there was a little bit of commission for the Delta Services as well, so I am not party to the business deal between Zureikat and Fortum. They asked me if I could help by arranging for this commission to be paid because he was not, as I understood, the official agent or something. I was not party to that except they asked me and I said yes.

Q93  Mr Healey: So you were given a lump sum by Fortum that was your commission plus some commission for Mr Zureikat that was owed to him in respect of some independent work he had done for them?

Dr Al-Chalabi: There was a commercial deal between Mr Zureikat and the oil company, okay, for which he was due some money, and the oil company said, "Do you mind doing this?", and I said no.

Q94  Mr Healey: So you were just passing on a payment?

Dr Al-Chalabi: I just passed the man the payment.

Q95  Sir Philip Mawer: Do you know what the nature of the commercial arrangement was?

Dr Al-Chalabi: I thought it was an oil deal. I mean, it is an oil company, so it was an oil deal.

Q96  Sir Philip Mawer: Is it possible—and you will know, sorry to backtrack—that the contract that we have been discussing, M/07/83, was initially for a lifting of three million barrels of oil. Subsequently it is alleged that it was increased by a further million so that the total that could be lifted under the contract was four million barrels.

Dr Al-Chalabi: I was a party to the three million. I know nothing about the extra million.

Q97  Sir Philip Mawer: I am clearly speculating here.

Mr Al-Mukhtar: Could I try and assist you in understanding the thing?

Q98  Sir Philip Mawer: May I put the point of my speculation and then you can by all means comment? Given what you have said, that you did not know anything about the additional million that was added to the contract, and given the material which has been put into the public domain suggesting that a request was made to add to the contract, a request which was actually made, according to what has become known as the IIS letter, by Mr Galloway and Mr Zureikat as his representative in Baghdad, it is possible that that commission payment may have related to the additional one million barrels which were later added to the contract about which you say you knew nothing.

Dr Al-Chalabi: I cannot comment on that, of course. I have no comment.

Q99  Sir Philip Mawer: You have no view on that, or at least you are not able to express any view on that?

Dr Al-Chalabi: No.