US digs in its heels on UN budget
By Harvey Morris 
December 16, 2007 
The Financial Times
Original Source: http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/33d9c974-ac11-11dc-82f0-0000779fd2ac.html

Officials of United Nations member states met throughout the weekend to try to avert a budget crisis over what the Bush administration has branded the largest proposed increase in spending in the organisation’s 62-year history.
The UN’s budget committee had set a deadline of this Wednesday to approve a request from Ban Ki-moon, UN se
cretary-general, for $4.2bn (£2bn, ¬ 2.9bn) to cover the UN s regular expenditure over the next two years.
But with the US digging in its heels over likely additional expenditure that it says could boost this total by a further $1bn, the UN faced the prospe
ct of entering 2008 without a budget.
When Mr Ban presented his first budget as secretary-general on October 25, he said the amount was “not much, considering the demands upon us”. Requesting $23m – or half a percentage point – increase for 2008-2009, he said: “Never has the world so needed a strong United Nations, yet never have our resources been stretched so thin.”
The same day, however, UN officials acknowledged that cost adjustments had already boosted the bottom line to $4.4bn, while additional items not accounted for would carry the total to more than $4.6bn.
In a closed-door meeting of member states last week, Mark Wallace, US deputy ambassador to the UN, said spending could be as high as $5.2bn – a 25 per cent rise – in view of further demands for funding expected in the coming year. “With the largest budget increase in history,” he said, “the credibility of the UN is at stake.”
Part of the US complaint is that three out of every four dollars of the regular budget go on the salaries of 10,000 staff and other related costs. “The . . . increase does not go directly to humanitarian or development aid but rather to increasing the size of the UN secretariat bureaucracy,” Mr Wallace said.
The regular budget does not include separate spending on the UN’s peacekeeping missions that is expected to soar to $7bn next year, mainly as a result of the deployment of a new UN-African Union peace force in Darfur.
The US is not the only state to condemn the UN’s “piecemeal” approach to budgeting, which involves not including expenditure on items it knows will arise in the coming months. Even the UN’s advisory budget watchdog agrees. This year the so-called add-ons range from extra spending on the UN human rights council to a new software system for the UN secretariat.
In late-night and weekend sessions away from the public eye at the UN’s New York headquarters, member state officials are horse-trading over pet projects to try to reach a deal. The US, for example, is likely to insist on renewing funding for a white-collar crime taskforce that has exposed hundreds of millions of dollars of fraud at the UN.
But, with the holiday season looming, Wednesday’s deadline may have to be pushed to the end of the year.
Diplomats of European Union states, which collectively are the biggest contributor to the UN, are being more conciliatory than the US, pushing for agreement at least on the figure of $4.2bn and deferring debate on the additional items to next year.
If the US holds out, however, the current budget would have to be rolled over into 2008.
One of the perennial problems facing UN administrators is the failure of some member states to pay their full dues. The US, the organisation’s biggest single contributor, is also the biggest debtor, owing $800m as of October.
US officials are unrepentant, saying Congress has to approve the budget allocations and that Congress has a duty to US taxpayers to ensure the money is well spent.