RUSSIAN officials yesterday furiously denied allegations linking companies and politicians to corruption in the UN oil-for-food programme for Iraq, saying that the report implicating them relied upon forgeries and false statements.

HALF of the 4,500 companies in the UN oil-for-food programme, including Volvo and Daimler Chrysler, paid €1.5 billion in kickbacks and illicit surcharges to Saddam Hussein’s government, a UN report has concluded.

George Galloway has been accused once again of receiving kickbacks from Saddam Hussein’s oil-for-food programme.