Fawaz Zureikat

Fawaz Abdullah Zureikat (or Zuraiqat or Zurayqat and variations) (1955 - ) is a wealthy Jordanian businessman.

Zureikat was implicated in the United Nations Oil for Food scandal relating to corruption surrounding Iraq's oil exports. In the 2004 Duelfer Report [http://www.lib.umich.edu/govdocs/pdf/duelfer1_eab.pdf] Zureikat is identified as receiving oil allocations from Iraq via Middle East Semi Conductors Co. In other documents, another company - Aredio Petroleum - is also linked to Zureikat. He'd been doing business in Iraq since 1986, and his brother Hatem was political prisoner in Syria since 1981 who once shared a cell with Tariq Aziz , and donated several hundred thousand pounds to George Galloway's Mariam Appeal charity. [http://www.sundayherald.com/33356] He also made payments to George Galloways wife.In August 2000 he also made a payment to Ron McKay.George Galloways Press spokesman.

For a time he was station manager of Arab Television (ATV), a short-lived English-language satellite channel with offices in London and Baghdad which filmed and distributed the worldwide rights to the pre-Iraq war interview conducted in Baghdad between Tony Benn and Saddam Hussein.

He was also a member of the National Mobilisation Committee for the Defence of Iraq (NMCDI), based in Jordan, and a passionate opponent of sanctions on Iraq. He was arrested on 3 March 2003 in Amman by Jordanian intelligence services, along with other prominent businessmen who had financial links with Saddam Hussein's regime. He was later released.

ee also

*George Galloway

External links

* Amnesty International, 24 March 2003, [http://web.amnesty.org/library/Index/ENGMDE160092003?open&of=ENG-JOR "Jordan: Possible prisoner of conscience/Legal concern, Fawaz Zurayqat"]
* James Cusick, Sunday Herald, 27 April 2003, [http://www.sundayherald.com/33356 "'I'm certain ... these documents are forged'"]