THE UN: A key investigator of the UN oil- for-food programme in Iraq has said there was "absolutely" no evidence UN secretary general Kofi Annan had interfered in the awarding of a contract to a firm that employed his son.
However, South African judge Richard Goldstone, said on Tuesday the inquiry was still investigating "vigorously" whether Mr Annan had advance knowledge of the bid by Swiss firm Cotecna Inspection SA, which was awarded a lucrative contract in the humanitarian programme for Iraq.
"We found absolutely no evidence implicating the secretary general, Mr Annan, in the award of the Cotecna contract," Mr Goldstone told the BBC.
"That was handled by the appropriate organs within the United Nations and there is absolutely not a tittle of evidence suggesting he tried to influence that decision."
Mr Goldstone is one of three commissioners leading the UN- established independent inquiry committee, along with Paul Volcker, former head of the US Federal Reserve, and Mark Pieth, a Swiss money-laundering expert.
Mr Annan's role will be analysed further in a report due in September, shortly before he hosts a summit on UN reforms with more than 170 world leaders.
Meanwhile, a senior Cypriot government official has said that it is unlikely to extradite the former head of the UN oil-for-food programme to face allegations of receiving bribes.
Benon Sevan, a Cypriot of Armenian descent, was accused by UN investigators of receiving almost $150,000 in kickbacks for oil allocations under the programme he headed from 1997 to 2003.
He has denied any wrongdoing.
Asked how authorities would respond to any extradition request, an official said: "There is a constitutional prohibition on extraditing one of our nationals to another jurisdiction." If a formal extradition request was filed, a court could cite the constitution to block it.