May 15, 2008
Get Out with a 'Planned' Withdrawal
A conversation with retired British Army General, Michael Rose about his book Washington's War: From Independence to Iraq.
Posted by davidphinney at 03:27 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)
May 14, 2008
Insurance Fraud in Iraq
It may be the biggest, most pervasive fraud taking place among US-funded contractors in Iraq.
Two contractors are now under criminal investigation for failing to obtain required insurance but charging for it anyway, according to the Associated Press. There may be many more soon to bear the same scrutiny:
The investigation of two companies located in Tikrit -- Sakar al-Fahal and al-Jubori -- led the Army Corps of Engineers to scour its records for evidence of fraud by other contractors hired with billions of U.S. dollars to help rebuild Iraqi infrastructure devastated by the war, the documents reveal.
Under federal law, all contractors doing work overseas for U.S. government agencies are required to insure their civilian employees, many of whom are handling dangerous jobs in hostile areas. The medical and disability insurance is called Defense Base Act coverage, a reference to the federal law mandating it. The State Department and US AID have their own in-house program, but other contractors must go to much more expensive private insurers.
According to the General Accountability Office, Defense contractors were paying up to $21 in workers' compensation premiums for each $100 in workers' salary, compared with as little as $2 in insurance costs for contractors employed by the State Department. The contractors' insurance premiums are borne by the government, which also pays the workers' claims if an injury or death is directly caused by a "war-risk hazard."
That has spawned a long, festering multi-billion-dollar problem and it has grown like a tumor in Iraq where contractors equal the numbers of US troops. As USA Today reported three years ago:
The Defense Department wants to overhaul a controversial $5.5 billion workers' compensation insurance program for its civilian contractors overseas after discovering that it is paying up to 10 times more for the insurance than other government agencies while leaving taxpayers exposed to large uncovered claims.
Posted by davidphinney at 06:19 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)
<!-- <rdf:RDF xmlns:rdf="http://www.w3.org/1999/02/22-rdf-syntax-ns#" xmlns:trackback="http://madskills.com/public/xml/rss/module/trackback/" xmlns:dc="http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/"> <rdf:Description rdf:about="http://www.davidphinney.com/pages/2008/05/pile_on_more_al.php" trackback:ping="http://www.davidphinney.com/movabletype/mt-tb.cgi/382" dc:title="Pile On: More Allegations of Cover Up at State" dc:identifier="http://www.davidphinney.com/pages/2008/05/pile_on_more_al.php" dc:subje