Indian Moves to Replace U.N.'s Annan 
June 17, 2006
Newsmax
Original Source: http://www.newsmax.com/archives/ic/2006/6/17/113639.shtml

You are certainly not obliged to answer any (press) questions about me as a candidate, which you are (then) welcome to direct to me personally. 
These were the words of the chief of the United Nation's Dept. of Public Information, Shashi Tharoor, in a private memo to his staff, a copy of which was obtained by NewsMax's Stew Stogel. 
Tharoor, an Indian national, and a 28-year veteran of the U.N. bureaucracy, was officially endorsed by New Delhi on Thursday as a candidate to replace retiring secretary-general Kofi Annan who leaves office at year's end. 
The so-called Asian group of nations is expected to produce a list of potential Annan successors under a rotating system of regional representation. 
In a rambling memo, Tharoor tells his staff: 
It would not be appropriate for me to seek your help in any way on my own behalf, nor is it appropriate for any Secretariat official to advance the claims of myself or any other candidate. 
What Tharoor fails to say is that under the rules guiding the U.N.'s civil service system, any such help or solicitation could result in fines or dismissal from the world body. 
The only other U.N. civil servant who ever sought the top job was Kofi Annan, who ran the U.N.'s peacekeeping affairs department prior to being elected secretary-general in 1996. 
I have never seen such a memo not asking for help, said a long-time U.N. staffer. 
The staffer insisted that Annan never wrote such a memo because it was clearly understood that such help violated U.N. rules. 
Tharoor has had a controversial tenure at the United Nations. 
A noted author as well as a U.N. official, Tharoor has had to battle repeated complaints by the U.N.'s staff union about his outside work. 
The union has repeatedly charged that Tharoor has used U.N. facilities and staff to assist in writing his books and maintaining his personal website, shashitharoor.com. 
Sources inside Annan's executive office have brushed aside the union's complaints, claiming that the secretary-general signed off on Tharoor's outside activities. 
While Annan himself ran for office on the platform of transparency, he has repeatedly failed to disclose any compensation he receives outside his own United Nations income, which is estimated to be $400,000 annually. 
Tharoor, like Annan, has also refused to disclose any details of his outside activities beyond noting several commercially published books. 
It is not clear what Tharoor's net worth is, his total income, nor whether he would put his holdings in a blind trust (like most U.S. politicians) should he be elected to the U.N.'s top job. 
Annan repeatedly declined to put his holdings in a blind trust. 
The issue of finances takes on new urgency at the U.N. in light of the ongoing Oil-for-Food scandal and the world body's growing budget deficit. 
To date, the U.N. has recovered less than $300,000 of more than $3 billion siphoned from the Iraq Oil-for-Food Program. 
The program's former director, Benon Sevan, fled to his native Cyprus where he remains beyond the legal reach of several U.S. congressional investigators. 
Sevan also continues to collect his full United Nations pension, estimated at more than $65,000 annually, which Secretariat sources say is diplomatically protected from any seizure by law enforcement authorities. 
The U.N. security council will formally begin a search for Annan's successor in September and expects to send a recommendation to the General Assembly in November. 
The recommendation would then need a majority vote of the GA's 191 members to become secretary-general. 
The new secretary-general would begin his 5 year term January 1, 2007.