M. Pasqua returns with exciting new insights into all that Iraqi oil sloshing around his good name.

PASQUA SAYS US 'USED' HIM IN OIL-FOR-FOOD CLAIM

PARIS, May 16 (AFP) - Former French interior minister Charles Pasqua on Monday accused the US Senate, which has implicated him in the UN oil-for-food scandal in Iraq, of using him as a way to discredit President Jacques Chirac.

As if Jack needed yahoo Americans to discredit him.

"Probably, they think I am close to Jacques Chirac and that I am his adviser. By choosing me, they hope to get at him," Pasqua told a press conference in Paris.

"The Americans must know that since 1995, I have not been one of Jacques Chirac's ministers, and in 1998, I broke away from his political movement. If I've been chosen as a target on that basis, someone made a mistake.

"I don't have the impression that I am a victim. I have the impression that I am being used," said Pasqua, now a member of the French senate.

The US Senate's Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations based its report on what it said were Iraqi oil ministry documents and the testimony of senior officials in Saddam's regime, ousted in the US-led invasion in March 2003.

Hhmmm, M. Pasqua is certain the Americans know he has not been a minister in the Jack shack since 1995, but apparently no one at state could manage a more plausible dupe. Or just pulled poor M. Pasqua's name from out of a hat.

Of course this is all pathetically laughable, but we remind you that M. Paqua has been exhausted denying these accusations whenever he picks up his phone. He wonders: "I have protested my innocence. Why doesn't this nasty business go away? (Pause. Aufklärung!) The Americans!"

And now -- wait for it -- what you've all been skimming for:

Pasqua on Monday reiterated his denial of the allegations.

"I totally refute the part of the report that refers to me," he said.

"If my name appears in certain Iraqi documents, that can only be the result of fraudulent behaviour on the part of certain people who have used my name," the former interior minister said.

As refutations go, we have to say this is a little weak. However, it does explain why the Americans thought M. Pasqua close to Jack. This is the corruption defense from Jack's playbook.

"I never went to Iraq, I never met Saddam Hussein and I never met with any Iraqis," Pasqua added.

In a letter to Chirac, released to the press on Monday, Pasqua wrote: "The French authorities would be making a grave mistake if they were to take these issues too lightly."

We couldn't agree more.

[Emphases added.]

"I never went to Iraq, I never met Saddam Hussein and I never met with any Iraqis," Pasqua added.

Kinda like how Galloway "Never saw a barrel of oil, never purchased a barrel of oil" etc.