Move the UN to Haiti, and see how many delegates go there or go home.....
Annan hits at US use of ‘the power of the purse’ at UN
Financial Times ^ | June 12 2006 | Mark Turner
The US use of “the power of the purse” to force through reforms at the United Nations is lessening the chance of those reforms succeeding, secretary-general Kofi Annan warns in Monday’s Financial Times.
At the same time, however, he calls on all countries, including the developing world, to “turn down their rhetoric” and take a constructive attitude towards this month’s UN budget negotiations, which threaten to pit rich against poor in a battle with potentially damaging consequences.
“The UN faces a moment of truth,” writes Mr Annan. He notes that the main contributors of UN funds, led by the US, linked the disbursement of cash after June 30 to significant progress on UN reform.
“We are now perilously near the deadline, and it is far from clear that enough reform to satisfy them has been achieved,” says the UN chief. “Neither side has found a way of engaging with the other to agree on further reforms.”
His comments follow last week’s high-profile dispute between John Bolton, the US ambassador, and Mark Malloch Brown, the UN deputy secretary-general, after the British official called for better US engagement with the world body.
Mr Bolton demanded a retraction, and on Friday said: “You have to ask what possible benefit the secretary-general and the deputy SG thought they were going to get from attacking the most important member of their organisation.
“The way this works in New York is that member governments give directions to the secretariat, not the other way round. He’s not a feudal lord and we’re not serfs.”
But Mr Annan writes on Monday that Mr Malloch Brown’s appeal was “absolutely right”. At the same time, he added that “the same message needs to be heard in many other countries besides the US”.
The developing world’s quarrel, he wrote, was “much less with the detail of proposed reforms, than with what they see as the overwhelming influence of a few rich countries”.
Dumisani Kumalo, the South African ambassador who leads the G77 group of developing countries, last week described the budget cap as a “poison” that needed to be removed. He said Mr Malloch Brown’s comments were “indicative of the feelings throughout the system”.
But the US State Department stood by Mr Bolton, and hinted that funding was at stake. |
