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Faced with a Royal Commission of Inquiry into the payment of approximately $A300 million in kickbacks to Saddam Hussein [9]'s government, in breach of the United Nations [10]' Iraq Oil-for-Food Program [11], the Australian wheat trader AWB Limited [12] hired crisis management [13] guru Peter Sandman [14] to help it draft an apology. The Australian inquiry released e-mails between Sandman and AWB, which reveal that Sandman's proposed confessional statement was watered down by ABW's other PR adviser, Ian Smith [15] from Gavin Anderson & Company [16]. "The less you blame yourself, the more the public will blame you. You aren't blaming yourself nearly enough in this draft," Sandman wrote [17] in one e-mail. Sandman's original three-page statement was eventually pared back to only one page. However, AWB executives decided not to make a public apology at all. The inquiry resumes public hearings in two weeks.
Links:
[1] http://dev.prwatch.org/users/7/bob-burton
[2] http://dev.prwatch.org/topics/public-relations/crisis-management
[3] http://dev.prwatch.org/topics/war-peace/iraq
[4] http://dev.prwatch.org/topics/ethics
[5] http://dev.prwatch.org/topics/international
[6] http://dev.prwatch.org/topics/public-relations
[7] http://dev.prwatch.org/topics/secrecy
[8] http://www.addtoany.com/share_save?linkurl=http%3A%2F%2Fdev.prwatch.org%2Fspin%2F2006%2F08%2F5075%2Fspinning-iraq-oil-kickbacks-confession&linkname=Spinning%20an%20Iraq%20Oil%20Kickbacks%20Confession
[9] http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Saddam_Hussein
[10] http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/United_Nations
[11] http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Oil-for-Food_Program
[12] http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/AWB_Limited
[13] http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/crisis_management
[14] http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Peter_Sandman
[15] http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Ian_Smith
[16] http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Gavin_Anderson_&_Company
[17] http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/row-flared-over-admission-awb-never-made/2006/08/10/1154803028480.html
[18] http://www.news.com.au/story/0,23599,20084091-1702,00.html