Trial of lobbyist in Iraqi oil-for-food case starts

NEW YORK, June 26 (Reuters) Jury selection today bagan in the trial of a South Korean lobbyist accused of acting as a unregistered foreign agent of former Iraqi President Saddam Hussein in the UN oil-for-food program.

Tongsun Park, 71, is alleged to have accepted millions of dollars from the Iraqi government and scheming with top UN and Iraqi officials to defraud the now-defunct program.

His trial US District Court in Manhattan is the first US federal case in the international scandal. Park has pleaded not guilty and faces a maximum of five years in prison and a 250,000 dolloars fine if convicted. Opening arguments were expected tomorrow.

The oil-for-food program allowed Iraq to sell oil and use the proceeds to buy nonmilitary goods, under United Nations supervision.

It aimed to ease the impact of UN sanctions imposed after Iraq's 1990 invasion of Kuwait but the 67 billion dollars program was rife with corruption, investigators say.

US and UN investigations have revealed that lobbyists, UN and Iraqi officials enriched themselves through kickbacks to arrange oil sales.

Park is one of several defendants indicted in the United States.

He faces charges of conspiracy to commit wire fraud, acting as an unregistered agent of a foreign government and money laundering.

US District Judge Denny Chin and attorneys in the case began jury selection by agreeing that potential jurors would be asked if anything they might know about the oil-for-food scandal could influence their ability to be fair.

Park gained notoriety in the 1970's as a lobbyist who gave hundreds of thousands of dollars to members of Congress as part of the influence-peddling scandal dubbed ''Koreagate.'' The judge ruled last week that evidence of his role in that affair was not relevant but said prosecutors could introduce evidence of Park's relationships with high-level UN officials, including former secretary general Boutros Boutros-Ghali.

Prosecutors say in 1993 Park met with an unnamed high-ranking UN official at his Manhattan apartment to set the terms of the program.

They contend Park worked with Samir Vincent, an Iraqi-American businessman who has pleaded guilty in the case and is cooperating with the government. He is expected to testify in this trial.

Last week Park was charged in Washington with lying to the FBI.

Prosecutors alleged he falsely told investigators he did not play a role in the adoption of a UN resolution that set up the oil-for-food program.

Other defendants in the case include Texas oil tycoon Oscar Wyatt and David Chalmers, of Houston-based Bayoil Inc, whose trial is set to start in November.

REUTERS SB KN2303