June 15, 2007 (LPAC)--The U.S. Justice Department has opened a preliminary investigation of whether the British aerospace company BAE paid bribes to win contracts in Saudi Arabia, Chile, and elsewhere, the Los Angeles Times reports today. Citing several unnamed U.S. law enforcement officials, the Times says that the investigation is focused on whether BAE violated the U.S. Foreign Corrupt Practices Act and U.S. money-laundering laws.

The Times's sources emphasized that the DOJ investigation is more extensive than previously reported. "It's not just the Saudi payments that are an issue here," said one official, adding that BAE deals with many other countries are also being scrutinized, and calling it "a company-wide thing."

The Saudi side of the probe, according to U.S. law enforcement officials, centers on Prince Bandar bin Sultan, the former Saudi Ambassador to the U.S., who is otherwise known to be a close ally of Vice President Dick Cheney.

Meanwhile, in a letter to Sir Menzies Campbell, leader of the Liberal Democrats, Britain's attorney general, Lord Goldsmith admitted to the fact that information was withheld from the anti-corruption probe by the OECD of the BAE-Saudi Arabia deal.

Lord Goldsmith wrote that he himself was not involved in any decision to withhold information, that was made by the Serious Fraud Office based on "national security" interests. "I did not know the judgment the SFO had reached about this issue until it arose in the media last week.... I gave no orders, instruction or advice to the SFO about that." He did admit that his director general, Jonathan Jones was at the Paris meeting with the OECD to "deal with the national security aspects" and that Jones "was aware in general of what the SFO proposed to say and participated in the discussions in preparation for the working group meeting." He then claimed that "what level of detail to give about particular payments" never arose in those discussions."

In response Sir Menzis said, "These events get curiouser and curiouser. Major decisions...were taken by officials and not by those with direct ministerial responsibility. The plain unvarnished truth is that Britain did not reveal significant information to the OECD."