Posted on 07/02/2003 12:25:45 PM PDT by knighthawk
GENEVA: Switzerland answered a U.S. request and ordered a freeze on any assets belonging to former Iraqi officials Wednesday, even though some Swiss officials complained that President George W. Bush is using the fight against terror to strengthen U.S. global "hegemony."
The government said banks and financial institutions must report any funds linked to 55 Iraqi officials named on the U.S. most-wanted list, including former President Saddam Hussein and his two sons. The list was approved by the U.N. Sanctions Committee earlier this week.
Switzerland had already ordered a precautionary freeze on Iraqi assets as a result of earlier U.N. Security Council resolutions. According to Swiss National Bank figures, some US$315 million in Iraqi assets were deposited in Swiss financial institutions at the end of last year, but there were no details on who the owners were.
Roland Vock, a sanctions expert at the State Secretariat for Economic Affairs, said the Swiss were still examining if they had a legal basis to comply with a request from U.S. Treasury Secretary John Snow that all Iraqi funds be confiscated and transferred to a fund to help rebuild Iraq.
Mindful of lingering international suspicions that Swiss banking secrecy acts as a cover for dictators' ill-gotten gains, Switzerland has been quick to block bank accounts and take other action in the war against terror.
But the Swiss, who are fiercely independent and jealously guard their personal privacy, are increasingly bristling at perceived U.S. heavy handedness and disregard for national sovereignty.
In an unusually scathing report published Tuesday, the Swiss Federal Data Protection Commissioner accused Washington of undermining national laws and running roughshod over bilateral accords.
"In the battle against the so-called axis of evil, the Bush administration is striving for hegemony at all levels," said Hanspeter Thuer. "Increasingly, national legislative powers are being undermined by U.S. attempts to impose their own legal system on the rest of the world."
As an example, Thuer cited U.S. demands that all airlines should release passenger data - including details about their religion, dietary habits and credit card numbers - or risk penalties which include the withdrawal of landing rights. Switzerland's national airline, Swiss, has been obliged to comply with this even though it breaches Swiss law.
"We are increasingly confronted by the fact that the United States is using the fight against terrorism as a cloak to impose a one-sided diktat," wrote Thuer in the introduction to his agency's annual report.
Bruce Armstrong, spokesman for the U.S. Embassy in the Swiss capital Bern, said Wednesday that he had no comment to make on the Swiss complaints.
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