Mr Tony Zureikat

20 December 2005

Q660  Sir Philip Mawer: What other contacts between Mr Galloway and senior figures in the former Iraqi regime are you aware of? You have mentioned the Minister of Agriculture, the Minister of Information and the Deputy Prime Minister.

Mr Zureikat: The Minister of Oil.

Q661  Sir Philip Mawer: The Minister of Oil you have just mentioned.

Mr Zureikat: Yes, they met with him.

Q662  Sir Philip Mawer: Can you describe what you know about that.

Mr Zureikat: I was not there. I know from Fawaz they went to the Ministry of Oil and after they met with the Minister of Oil because of that meeting the Ministry of Oil made an appointment for Fawaz with the SOMO and that is where Fawaz's relations started with SOMO.

Q663  Sir Philip Mawer: SOMO is S-O-M-O the State Oil Marketing Organisation?

Mr Zureikat: Yes.

Q664  Sir Philip Mawer: And do you remember what the date of that meeting with the Ministry of Oil was?

Mr Zureikat: No but for sure I know, I have been told by Fawaz because the last visit—let's go to the last visit of Galloway for a minute to tie it with the oil thing—after Galloway met with Saddam Hussein at the last meeting, I went with Fawaz—

Q665  Sir Philip Mawer: Can you remember the date of that?

Mr Zureikat: You can get it off the TV. It was all over the news. The last meeting with Saddam. He was all over the news.

Q666  Ms Barry: "Sir, I salute you," that one?

Q667  Sir Philip Mawer: Never mind, it is the last one.

Mr Zureikat: I think December or January.

Q668  Sir Philip Mawer: 2002/03?

Mr Zureikat: Before the war, 2002 or the beginning of 2003, but for more assurance it is all over the news, you can pull it from anywhere. I was there. They took him to the interview. If you recall, he did the statement that upset Aziz and Saddam Hussein. Galloway told the reporters at that time that they put him in an elevator, they went down and he described an unknown place and it was like Saddam's hiding place. He said it on the air.

Q669  Sir Philip Mawer: Right?

Mr Zureikat: And Aziz got upset and Fawaz called him and he re-did his statement and changed something. I was not following that, but my point here is that after the meeting with Saddam, me and Fawaz went to the Al-Rashid Hotel because they were flying to Syria in Aziz's jet. I went there with Fawaz to see him and to see how it went and he wanted to send his luggage with me because I was going by car, and he wanted to send his luggage with me to Amman. I went there and he said, "We got one and lost one." They got the approval on the TV station but refusal on the increased oil share.

Q670  Sir Philip Mawer: This information came from whom?

Mr Zureikat: I was there, I saw him, heard him, I was standing in his room in the Al-Rashid Hotel.

Q671  Sir Philip Mawer: This was George Galloway himself telling Fawaz the result of the meeting?

Mr Zureikat: Yes. So they lost the oil increase but they got the TV station.

Q672  Sir Philip Mawer: And the TV station was the Arab TV station based in London.

Mr Zureikat: Yes, Stuart was running the show for this TV station.

Q673  Sir Philip Mawer: Is that Stuart Halford?

Mr Zureikat: Yes.

Q674  Sir Philip Mawer: He was the Director of Operations for the Mariam Appeal?

Mr Zureikat: He is also involved in a newspaper here, a Sunday newspaper in Scotland or in George's home town.

Q675  Sir Philip Mawer: Are you thinking of Ron McKay who is a journalist and associated with Mr Galloway? Have you met Ron McKay at all?

Mr Zureikat: Maybe if I saw him. Many people came through Amman from Britain, Palestine and from Palestine to Baghdad.

Q676  Sir Philip Mawer: But it is Stuart?

Mr Zureikat: It is Stuart because once I went with Galloway to Mariam's home and we took some pictures and Stuart wanted the pictures for the Sunday report. They asked me to do a favour and try to email them. It was a weekend and nobody was there. I was in Iraq so Fawaz and George asked me to do this favour, so I took the pictures, developed the pictures. I am not sure, maybe it was a digital camera or not, I do not know. I scanned them and I sent the email to Stuart here in London for the Sunday report but I think that is the only Stuart.

Q677  Sir Philip Mawer: Yes, the only Stuart I am aware of is Stuart Halford.

Mr Zureikat: That is him. It is the only Stuart involved with Fawaz and George, yes.

Q678  Sir Philip Mawer: Right. And so we have just been discussing the last meeting with Saddam Hussein.

Mr Zureikat: Yes.

Q679  Sir Philip Mawer: Were you ever present when George and were you aware of any occasions on which George and Fawaz discussed how the money, which on your account they must have been receiving jointly, would be transferred?

Mr Zureikat: I am aware of a conversation with Fawaz himself. Let's go back to my first visit. We have agreed to co-operate, okay. At the beginning of 2002 we formed a company registered in Jordan, okay, and the company managed to get a contract. We were in Baghdad at an exhibition and the Minister of Agriculture was walking by and he saw the equipment. He asked me what the equipment was and I said water drilling rigs. He was in the German branch or German wing and he asked his people, "I want to buy those rigs instead of the Italian ones" because there was some bad smell on a contract between the people of the Ministry and the Italian company Soilmac, so I was asked to contact the supply company and the second day I went and we formed a contract which was under my company and Fawaz's. That was the first contract Fawaz was supposed to get with big money. Until the beginning of 2002 Fawaz did not have that big chunk of money. He was making a small commission on the oil money and sending it back. Really he was surviving on just five or six or seven cents of the oil. Once Fawaz got over 200,000/240,000/260,000 for the price of oil he kept it and he worked with it to get facilities from banks. Some of them got upset and he had to write to Aziz to get him to pay out a little bit to pay that money back.