Cheney’s former firm may have overcharged US Army for fuel

A PENTAGON audit has found United States Vice President Dick Cheney’s former company may have overcharged the Army by $1.09 per gallon for nearly 57 million gallons of gasoline delivered to citizens in Iraq, senior defence officials say.

Auditors found potential overcharges of up to $61m for gasoline that a Halliburton subsidiary delivered as part of its no-bid contract to help rebuild Iraq's oil industry.

But the company apparently didn't profit from the discrepancy, according to officials who spoke on condition of anonymity. The problem, the officials said, was that Halliburton may have paid a Kuwaiti subcontractor too much for the gasoline in the first place.

Defence Secretary Donald H Rumsfeld stressed the Pentagon had a "fairly normal process" for reviewing contractors' bills before payment is made.

"We've got auditors that crawl all over these things, and what you're reading about in the paper is not an overpayment at all," he said.

"It ... may be a disagreement between the company and the Department of Defence ... and possibly between the company and subcontractors as to what ought to be charged, but there has not to my knowledge been any overpayment."

A Halliburton statement said the Kuwaiti company was the only one that met the Army Corps of Engineers' specifications. "Halliburton only makes a few cents on the dollar when fuel is delivered from Kuwait to Iraq," the statement read.

Democratic presidential candidates said the audit demonstrated the Bush administration's commitment to special and corporate interests.

"We've recently learned what many Americans have suspected for a long time special interest contributor Halliburton is overcharging the American taxpayers," said Howard Dean. "For the safety of our troops, we need to make sure every penny in Iraq is spent wisely and efficiently."

Meanwhile, Iraqi insurgents bombarded the fortified headquarters of the US-led coalition in Baghdad early yesterday, the first attack on the compound since US forces launched a mass anti-guerrilla offensive a month ago.