Halliburton Shrugs Off Bribe Probe

The Journal specifically highlighted millions of dollars that may have wound up in a Swiss bank account controlled by former KBR Chairman Albert J. "Jack" Stanley. Stanley retired from Halliburton in December, the Journal stated, but continues to serve as a consultant for the company. The newspaper also reported that French officials remain focused on $180 million in payments made by KBR to a company run by Jeffrey Tesler, whom Halliburton has portrayed as a legitimate business agent who collected a standard 2% fee for securing the multibillion-dollar natural gas project.

"As anyone who does business in Nigeria knows, one needs an agent in Nigeria," Halliburton CFO Christopher Gaut told investors last week, according the Journal report.

News of the formal SEC probe came just days after Democrat Henry Waxman of California, ranking minority member of the House Committee on Government Reform, demanded fresh information about Cheney's relationship with Halliburton. In a letter dated Sunday, Waxman asked the vice president for any communication from his office related to the company's big contract -- awarded outside the competitive bidding process -- to restore and operate Iraq's lucrative oil business.

Waxman sent his eight-page letter after a briefing last week that, the lawmaker believes, offers new evidence that Cheney's office was more involved in the Halliburton contract than the vice president has claimed. He pointed to information provided by Michael Mobbs, a special adviser to the undersecretary of defense for policy, and an email from the Army Corps of Engineers mentioning "coordinated" activity by the vice president's office, in an effort to support his theory.

"Mr. Mobbs informed us that he briefed your chief of staff, Mr. [Lewis] Libby, and other senior White House and Administration officials about the proposal to award the contingency contract to Halliburton without giving other companies an opportunity to compete," Waxman wrote. "According to Mr. Mobbs, this briefing occurred before the contract was awarded and was provided so that Mr. Libby and the other officials would have an opportunity to object."