THE RISE AND FALL OF AWB
* Australian Wheat Board had monopoly over international trade in Australian wheat from 1939
* By 1999, marketing and transfer functions transferred to grower-owned AWB Group. AWB Ltd heads that structure, lists on stock market 2001
* UN imposes sanctions after Iraq's 1990 invasion of Kuwait
* UN oil-for-food program runs 1997 to 2003
* AWB wins wheat sales with Iraqi Grain Board
* Iraq is AWB's biggest or close to biggest customer
* Sales worth more than $500 mln a year
* Unknown to its international competitors, AWB accepts lower price than revealed in contracts
* Inflated by sham, so-called `inland transportation' and `after-sales service fees'
* Payments always made via intermediary based in Jordan, linked to Iraqi authorities
* AWB then obtains funds from UN escrow account
* AWB pays $US223 million in those fees to intermediary company Alia between July 1999 and March 2003
* AWB in effect becomes exporter of wheat and cash, ASIC says
* UN oil-for-food program ends after coalition forces invade Iraq in 2003
* Cole inquiry in 2006 finds AWB knowingly made secret payments to Saddam Hussein regime
* AWB taken over by Canadian company Agrium in 2010
* Former chairman Trevor Flugge and former group general manager trading Peter Anthony Geary face 10-week civil trial for allegedly breaching their duties as officers
* Maximum penalty: Fines up to $200,000 and disqualification from managing a corporation.
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