Wheat Cheats expose government

Fifteen intelligence reports on the corruption in the UN's oil-for-food program were earlier suppressed by the Cole inquiry at the request of the Government on national security grounds.
The released summaries of these reports will put the Prime Minister, John Howard, the Foreign Affairs Minister, Alexander Downer, and the former defence minister Robert Hill under renewed pressure over the scandal.
The damning material was supplied by foreign intelligence services between 1998 and 2004 and then distributed throughout the bureaucracy.
According to a sworn statement to the Cole inquiry, it was passed to "departments, other agencies and certain ministerial offices in accordance with normal agency practice and as shown on each document distribution list".
Despite these reports, the Government did not order its own agencies to collect intelligence on AWB and other Australian companies dealing with Iraq under the oil-for-food program.
Nor did the reports provoke the Foreign Affairs and Trade Department to take steps to ensure there was no breach of UN sanctions.
[Foreign Minister,] Downer has repeated his claim that the intelligence had not raised any concerns about AWB. "There wasn't any Australian intelligence reporting and there wasn't any intelligence reporting from our foreign partners … that specifically mentioned AWB."
However, the reports set out in precise detail the system of kickbacks now known to have been used by AWB. Alia was identified as early as 1998 as "part owned by the Iraqi government and … involved in circumventing UN sanctions on behalf of the Iraqi government". Sydney Morning Herald