07 June 2007

Bandar, aka Bandar Bush, Saudi Prince 'Received Arms Cash'

It should be noted that he is so close to the Bush family that he's called "Bandar Bush".
BBC NEWS | Business | Saudi prince 'received arms cash': "A Saudi prince who negotiated a £40bn arms deal between Britain and Saudi Arabia received secret payments for over a decade, a BBC probe has found.

The UK's biggest arms dealer, BAE Systems, paid hundreds of millions of pounds to the ex-Saudi ambassador to the US, Prince Bandar bin Sultan.

The payments were made with the full knowledge of the Ministry of Defence.

Prince Bandar would not comment on the investigation and BAE Systems said it acted lawfully at all times.

The MoD said information about the Al Yamamah deal was confidential.

Sir Raymond Lygo, a former chief executive of BAE, told the BBC's World Business Report that there had been 'nothing untoward' about the arms deal.

'I was the one who won the contract,' he said. 'I don't know anything about him (the prince) at all. I would have remembered that name.'

When asked about the secret payments, Sir Lygo said that it was not going on when the deal was signed.

'I would have known if it was going on at the time. I was not aware of it, so as far as I am concerned it was not occuring.

'Yes, we paid agents. Nothing illegal about that. It was absolutely in accordance with the law at the time... there was nothing untoward about the deal whatsoever."

Private plane

The investigation found that up to £120m a year was sent by BAE Systems from the UK into two Saudi embassy accounts in Washington.

...
£120m/year. At current exchange rates, that's about $240 million.

High priced agent. He's getting more a year than A-Rod, whose agent gets even less than that.

0 comments :

Post a Comment