Backstabbing for Beginners (2018) on Netflix

Plot summary

In the fall of 2002, twenty-four-year-old Michael Sullivan leaves a lobbying job for the diplomatic corps of the United Nations, hoping to make a difference. He becomes assistant to Costa Pasaris, known as Pasha, who runs the Oil-for-Food program, the largest humanitarian operation the organization has mounted: Iraqi oil is sold at market value, and the proceeds buy food and medicine for Iraqis rather than fund Saddam Hussein's regime. In Baghdad, the local UN chief, Christina Dupre, tells Pasha that the program is riddled with corruption and that she intends to publish a report saying so. Michael meets his interpreter, Nashim Hussani, and sees expired medicines at Iraqi clinics. Pasha teaches him the realities of diplomacy, arguing that billions of dollars do reach the Iraqi people.