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- Posted February 16, 2010 at 10:54 pm
ON JANUARY 16, 2006, John Agius, SC, began lifting the lid on how AWB sold wheat to Iraq when the international community was trying to apply maximum economic pressure on Saddam Hussein.
The counsel assisting’s opening address to a commission of inquiry was explosive: AWB had knowingly and secretly channelled $US222 million ($A247 million) to the Iraqi government from 1999 to 2003, in breach of United Nations sanctions.
The grains exporter denied this, as it had denied complaints about the kickbacks from US wheat growers in 2003 and the findings of a UN inquiry on the same subject in 2005.
The share price began to slide.
On January 19, a board statement said AWB was ”aware of its disclosure obligations under [Stock Exchange Listing Rule] 3.1 and confirms that it is in compliance with that rule”.
The next day, then prime minister John Howard said AWB’s hold on its valuable ”single desk” export monopoly was ”something that should be looked at”.
The shares fell further.
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