By JAD MOUAWAD
The New York Times
October 15, 2009
Marc Rich, the former fugitive oil trader long criticized for his business ties to nations like Iran, South Africa and Cuba, has acknowledged in a new book that his dealings with those nations were more extensive than previously disclosed.
In more than 30 hours of conversations with a Swiss journalist, Daniel Ammann, the usually tight-lipped Mr. Rich gave an extensive account of his oil trading from the 1970s through the 1990s.
Those dealings, which straddled ideological lines from Ayatollah Khomeini’s Iran to Fidel Castro’s Cuba and from the apartheid regime of South Africa to the leftist Sandinista government in Nicaragua, are recounted in Mr. Ammann’s book, “The King of Oil: The Secret Lives of Marc Rich,” released this week by St. Martin’s Press.
In 1983, Mr. Rich was indicted by the United States on charges of tax evasion as well as trading with an enemy state, Iran. He fled the United States and became one of the nation’s most infamous fugitives over the next two decades.
Mr. Rich told the author that while on the run, he provided intelligence to American diplomats about Iran, the Soviet Union and other countries. He was granted a controversial pardon by President Bill Clinton on the last day of his presidency.
The article continues at NYT.
