Ireland to co-chair UN reform group

By http://www.ireland.com/newspaper/breaking/2008/0116/breaking56.htmPaul Anderson
January 16, 2008
Irealand.com
Original Source: http://www.ireland.com/newspaper/breaking/2008/0116/breaking56.htm

An Irish diplomat has been appointed to co-chair a United Nations task force aimed at reforming the international body, which has been rocked by scandals, accusations of gross inefficiency and long standing questions over its effectiveness. 
Paul Kavanagh, Permanent Representative of Ireland to the United Nations, will co-chair the Working Group on UN Reform which hopes to implement new policies for accountability, transparency and cost effectiveness within the UN. Tanzanian Ambassador the UN in New York Augustine Mahiga is the other co-chair. 
Mr Kavanagh was previously Ireland's Ambassador to the United Nations in Geneva and at the European Union in Brussels. 
Former secretary general Kofi Annan appointed a panel of senior governmental figures in 2006 after the World Summit the previous year. 
The High Level Panel on System-wide Coherence, which included three prime ministers - among them Jens Stoltenberg of Norway - then British chancellor of the exchequer Gordon Brown and EU Commissioner Louis Michel, reported in November 2006 and the working group was created on its recommendation. 
Barbados and Luxembourg chaired the initial the work of the group. Ireland and Tanzania will now take over the job of coaxing UN members to agree on implementing the recommendations of the High Level Panel over the coming months. 
Minister for Foreign Affairs Dermot Ahern said: Continuing reform is underway at the United Nations, but greater coherence is required across the work of its broad system of agencies, funds and programmes in the development, humanitarian and other fields. 
The reforms could also counter the deliberate misuse of funding. A series of scandals within the UN began to emerged over the past 10 years including corruption within its oil-for-food programme in Iraq. Mr Annan's son, Kojo, was implicated in the scandal and there have also been claims of sexual abuse and corruption among UN peacekeepers. 
Last week, the UN's Office of Internal Oversight Services said it had identified 250 cases of concern, which it said was unexpectedly high.