Thursday, June 1, 2006

Ethics Official Lacked Details on Abramoff

A government ethics official said she did not know about Jack Abramoff's interest in property controlled by the General Services Administration when she told the agency's chief of staff he could accept a trip to Scotland from the lobbyist.

Former GSA chief of staff David Safavian, 38, is on trial on charges of making false statements to agency ethics officers and others in connection with the August 2002 trip and then obstructing inquiries into the matter. He is accused of concealing Abramoff's interest in government business. Safavian pleaded not guilty.

Eugenia Ellison, the GSA ethics official, testified in federal court in Washington yesterday that she did not know Safavian was helping Abramoff in regard to GSA-controlled properties. She wrote in her ethics opinion that Safavian could accept airfare to Scotland because his friend, Abramoff, had no business and was not seeking to do business with GSA.

Prosecutor Nathaniel Edmonds asked Ellison about five items of information, including whether she knew Abramoff was interested in a short-term lease from GSA and whether she knew that Safavian helped Abramoff draft a letter to GSA. Each time, Ellison said no.

Asked whether she would have wanted to know such information before issuing her ethics opinion, Ellison replied yes. Asked whether such information could have altered her ethics opinion, she again replied yes.

Andrew C. von Eschenbach, the acting head of the Food and Drug Administration, announced yesterday that he will resign next month from his job as director of the National Cancer Institute.

His resignation from the NCI will be effective June 10, said Christina Pearson, a spokeswoman for the Department of Health and Human Services.

Von Eschenbach's holding of both positions -- one as director of a government institute that helps develop drugs, and the other as head of the federal agency that regulates them -- had raised questions of a potential conflict of interest.

The urology surgeon has led the NCI since 2002. He became acting FDA commissioner in September 2005. In March, President Bush nominated him to lead the regulatory agency full time. Von Eschenbach, a Bush friend, said at the time that he intended to leave his NCI post. His confirmation as FDA commissioner remains in limbo over a dispute involving the agency's position on emergency contraceptive pills.

John Niederhuber, the NCI's deputy director, will become the agency's acting director, Pearson said.

Former attorney general Edwin Meese III has replaced former New York mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani as a member of the Iraq Study Group, the group's co-chairmen announced yesterday.

Meese served as attorney general during the Reagan administration and holds the Ronald Reagan chair in public policy at the Heritage Foundation. Giuliani resigned in May from the 10-member bipartisan study group that provides assessments of conditions in Iraq and the surrounding region.

James A. Baker III and Lee H. Hamilton are co-chairmen of the group.

-- From News Services