State Dept.
investigates U.N.
overpayment credit
By George Archibald
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
he State Department inspector general is investigating
charges by a Senate committee chairman that the Clinton
administration hid a $42 million overpayment credit from the
United Nations as it sought even more money from Congress
for the world body.
The probe was announced yesterday after Sen. Rod
Grams, Minnesota Republican, asked State why officials at the
U.S. Mission in New York conspired to keep the information
from Congress, according to government e-mail records.
"By keeping this information from Congress, it appears that
the State Department hopes to prevent Congress from
reducing the amount of money it
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appropriates to pay the arrears," Mr. Grams said.
The probe also involves charges that the U.S. Mission and
the State Department have retaliated against a Senior Executive
Service officer in New York, Linda S. Shenwick, who
provided congressional committees and aides with U.N.
financial data at their request.
The IG's investigation was sparked by the administration's
failure to inform Congress that Joseph Connor, the U.N.'s
undersecretary-general for administration, told U.S. officials
last July that U.S. arrears were reduced by $42 million because
of lower-than-expected spending by U.N. peacekeeping
operations.
At the same time, the State Department was preparing to
ask Congress to allow the administration to spend another
$20.4 million peacekeeping windfall, reaped from
currency-exchange gains, on other U.N. nonpeacekeeping
activities -- including implementation of the Law of the Sea
Treaty, which Congress has resisted supporting.
Mr. Connor and U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan have
been waging a media and public relations blitz in the United
States to pressure the administration and Congress to pay U.S.
arrears of about $1 billion, going back many years. An
administration-negotiated bill passed by Congress to pay the
arrears is on President Clinton's desk awaiting signature.
An imminent payment of $211 million to $240 million is
required to save the United States from losing its General
Assembly vote under Article 19 of the U.N. Charter,
according to a recent report by the congressional General
Accounting Office. The $42 million credit was apparently not
factored into the GAO numbers.
E-mail messages between officials at the U.S. Mission to
the United Nations show that Mr. Connor told the mission two
months ago about the $42 million credit to the United States,
which pays more than 25 percent of all U.N. costs.
But Robert Orr, top aide to Assistant Ambassador Richard
Sklar, third-ranking U.S. diplomatic representative at U.N.
headquarters, ordered officials at the mission to hide the
information from Miss Shenwick, the mission's counselor for
resources management, who deals directly with House and
Senate committees on U.N. finances, according to the
messages.
"In the course of Connor's call, he said that our arrears are
being reduced by $42 million due to unexpended
[peacekeeping] obligations," James B. Bond, an adviser for
resources management at the U.N. Mission wrote in a July 28
e-mail message to Susan M. Shearouse, deputy counselor for
resources management.
Mr. Bond said Mr. Connor would send Bill Richardson,
then U.S. ambassador to the U.N., "a letter explaining all. Orr
wants it kept from Linda, so the Congress doesn't find out
about it," he said in the e-mail. "But if it's in a letter, will she see
it anyway? I suppose we can be discreet in the interim."
Mr. Bond and Miss Shearouse said they were unable to
comment "without clearance." Mr. Sklar did not respond to a
written request for an interview. Miss Shenwick, who is on
leave following surgery, was unavailable for comment.
Victoria Toensing, a partner at the Washington law firm
DiGenova & Toensing, responded to messages left for Miss
Shenwick.
"The State Department is trying to get rid of Linda
Shenwick because she is a whistleblower," said the attorney,
who said she had been retained to defend Miss Shenwick.
"She has provided Congress crucial facts that certain people at
State don't want Congress to have. Preventing this attempt to
get rid of her for doing her duty is important for all
whistleblowers."
Miss Shenwick, an officer at the U.N. Mission for many
years, is a financial and management analyst who watches
ever-changing U.N. finances and budget data for the United
States. Mr. Sklar, U.S. representative for U.N. reform and
management issues, sits on the U.N. General Assembly's
powerful assessment and appropriations panel called the Fifth
Committee.
For years Miss Shenwick has responded to congressional
inquiries on U.N. finances and management issues, according
to Carlos Aranaga, spokesman for the U.S. mission to the
U.N. He said it was "an informal arrangement because we
don't have a congressional liaison, per se."
House and Senate members and their staffs from both
parties said they have routinely worked with Miss Shenwick to
obtain up-to-date and breaking information about the world
body's finances.
"The nonpayment of U.S. arrears has been a major issue
within the U.N. and a topic of considerable debate within
Congress," Mr. Grams, chairman of the Senate Foreign
Relations Committee's subcommittee on international
operations, told Bonnie R. Cohen, undersecretary for
management at State, at a Senate hearing on Thursday.
"Many of us in the Congress have been concerned,
however, that the State Department has been more occupied
with increasing the amount of the United States' arrears
payments and eliminating any congressional conditions on those
payments than working to achieve real reform at the United
Nations," the senator said.
Miss Cohen appeared to justify a State Department request
to reprogram the $20.4 million exchange-rate windfall to other
U.N. operations and to use $6.4 million in unspent funds from
fiscal year 1993 to reduce U.S. arrears.
She was unable to explain why news of the $42 million
U.N. credit was withheld from lawmakers.
"It is not only the withholding of information from Congress,
but the scheming to keep the information from an employee
who would tell Congress the truth that I find so disturbing," Mr.
Grams told Miss Cohen at the hearing.
"I want you to know that State has created a culture of fear
at the U.S. Mission where employees are afraid that they will
lose their jobs as a result, or face other reprisals, if they answer
our queries openly and honestly."
The U.N. Mission declined to comment, saying the State
Department would respond to inquiries from The Washington
Times.
Joe Dickie, a spokesman at State's Bureau of International
Organizational Affairs, disputed parts of Mr. Bond's e-mail.
"The reference to a letter reportedly promised in July by the
U.N. to Ambassador Richardson is apparently the result of an
inaccurate read-out of the results of a meeting between U.N.
and U.S. officials at which the unencumbered [peacekeeping]
balances were raised," he said in a written statement.
Mr. Dickie said the State Department recalculates U.N.
credits at a reduced amount before reporting them to
Congress.
"U.N. records credit the U.S. for the unencumbered
balances as if we pay for 30.5 percent of peacekeeping costs,
but by U.S. law we pay at a 25 percent rate. Therefore, the
long-standing practice is to recalculate an unencumbered
balances at the 25 percent rate before taking them off current
peacekeeping bills," he said in a statement.
However, Senate aides said the United Nations, with
administration support, assesses the United States at a 30.5
percent rate for peacekeeping operations, despite U.S. law.
Therefore, credits should be applied to claimed U.S. arrears at
the full 30.5 percent rate, they said.
"There never has been any intention on the part of the
administration to mislead Congress regarding the status of
unencumbered balances on U.N. peacekeeping accounts," Mr.
Dickie said. |
