U.N.'s New Budget Has Cap on Spending
Deal's Goal Is Revising Management

By Edith M. Lederer
December 24, 2005
The Washington Post
Original Source: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/12/23/AR2005122301539_pf.html
UNITED NATIONS, Dec. 23 -- U.N. members agreed Friday night on a two-year budget that seriously restricts spending and applies pressure for management changes -- a top priority for the United States and the European Union.
The General Assembly's budget committee was expected to approve the $3.8 billion plan, which includes a spending cap next year of $950 million.
U.S. Ambassador John R. Bolton called the approval a victory for the United States. Britain's U.N. Ambassador Emyr Jones Parry, whose country holds the EU presidency, said he would claim victory for the United Nations.
The agreement was reached after weeks of intense negotiations and a final round of meetings in the private office of General Assembly President Jan Eliasson. Ambassadors from wealthy and developing nations who had been at odds emerged together to announce a deal had been reached.
The United States, Japan, Europe and other wealthy nations who pay about 85 percent of the U.N.'s budget joined forces to back a $950 million spending cap next year -- which means the United Nations will probably run out of money in six months.
Their aim is to put pressure on all U.N. members to agree on management changes by June, so that when the General Assembly is asked to approve another $950 million to cover U.N. operations for the rest of 2006, there will be sufficient progress for a yes vote.
The powerful Group of 77, which represents 132 mainly developing countries and China, had said it would only agree to a $1.35 billion cap on U.N. spending. Several key members, including Egypt and India, objected to any link between the new budget and management overhaul.
But Bolton said the link is implicit in the way the cap will operate. This evening the United States obtained something it had been striving for the last three months, which is a clear linkage between management reform and the budget process of the United Nations, he said.
Jamaica's U.N. Ambassador Stafford Neil said the Group of 77 achieved some positive results. It wanted a two-year budget and got it: The 2006-2007 budget will total $3.8 billion.
Egypt's U.N. Ambassador Maged Abdelaziz said developing nations are doing our best on the reform process . . . but at the same time we don't want to be pressured by the budget.
Earlier this month, Bolton called for an interim U.N. budget of three or four months so that member states would have time to approve and fund management revisions expected early in the year.
Several members of Congress threatened to withhold U.S. dues to the United Nations if the overhaul is not enacted.
Bolton's interim budget got no support, but Japan, Canada, Australia and New Zealand came up with the idea of a cap, which the United States quickly backed.