US Worried About Fate of UN Management Reforms 
By Reuters
November 28, 2005
The New York Times
Original Source: http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/news/news-un-reform-usa.html

UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - U.S. Ambassador John Bolton urged the United Nations and governments on Monday to crack down on corruption and mismanagement turned up by a probe of the U.N. oil-for-food program for Iraq.
The oil-for-food investigation, led by former U.S. Federal Reserve Chairman Paul Volcker, last month accused 2,200 companies in 66 countries of steering $1.8 billion in bribes and kickbacks to Saddam Hussein's government.
Volcker's commission also recommended extensive U.N. management reforms to prevent future fraud and abuse.
Among the reforms under consideration are creation of a new ethics office, enhanced auditing, stronger protections for whistle-blowers, and a review of all existing U.N. program mandates to see whether they should be terminated or extended.
``The central insights of the Volcker commission about corruption and mismanagement are at risk of not receiving the kind of attention that they need,'' Bolton told reporters.
``I know it's painful to talk about the criticisms that Volcker made, but if you don't talk about the criticisms and you don't talk about the problems, how can you expect you are going to find a solution?''
U.S. prosecutors are pursuing several cases of alleged wrongdoing by U.S. businesses and executives and ``I just hope other (U.N.) member governments do the same,'' Bolton said.
He reiterated Washington's opposition to adoption by the U.N. General Assembly next month of its usual two-year budget unless monies for U.N. reforms are included.
``We do not want to be in a position where we adopt a budget next month and we get no more reform for the two-year life of the budget,'' Bolton said.
The U.S. envoy startled the 191-nation General Assembly earlier this month by proposing that it adopt a three- or four-month interim budget until reforms could be funded.
The European Union and many poor nations feared Washington wanted to trigger a funding crisis to force through reforms.
``We have never said we are going to hold the budget up.'' Bolton said. ``We are not looking for a situation where there is no funding for the activities of the organization.''
``But by the same token we don't want a two-year biennium budget adopted next month and then lose any possibility of seeing the secretariat's mandate review reflected in changes in the budget,'' he said.