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Annan Says U.N. Budget Showdown Can Be Avoided
Secretary General Kofi Annan said today he thought the United Nations would avoid a threatened budget showdown the end of this month, but he warned against threats to "pull the plug" on the organization if it didn't meet some countries' expectations."The cap on the budget will be lifted, there will be no crisis, as far as I can see, this month," Mr. Annan told a press conference. Led by the United States, the major contributors to the United Nations in December obtained a six-month cap on the current budget that links disbursement of money after June 30 to progress in management reforms. In addition, John R. Bolton, the American ambassador, periodically hinted that if there weren't sufficient changes, the United States Congress would move to withhold United Nations dues. Mr. Annan predicted enough movement on reform to forestall a crisis, but he added that the tactic pressed by the United States had provoked a strong counterreaction from many nations. "For someone to say that because you have not reformed to my satisfaction, I am going to pull the plug and stop all the activities is going to be a very hard sell for other member states to swallow and rightly so," he said.
"We hope we can agree on a consensus decision with respect to the expenditure cap which the United States, the European Union and Japan all said should be based on substantial movement on the reform question by June 30 and a roadmap through the end of the year," he said. Mr. Bolton said the group was adopting a "flexible, accommodating position" but needed to achieve progress in increasing accountability, measures to toughen oversight and action to start eliminating committees with expired mandates. "What we'd like to see is substantial progress in some combination in all three of those areas, but we have not said, 'This is a prerequisite or that is an absolute prerequisite,'" he said. Relations between Mr. Annan and Mr. Bolton remained strained in the aftermath of a speech by Mark Malloch Brown, the deputy secretary general, last week asserting that the United States failed to stand up for the United Nations or acknowledge its value to American policy makers, letting its harshest American detractors dominate debate. Mr. Bolton unsuccessfully sought a repudiation of the remarks from Mr. Annan, and he complained that they represented a patronizing attack on American public opinion. He added that they would set back the cause of reform. Mr. Annan disagreed with that thinking today, saying that a "poisonous" atmosphere that had arisen between the wealthy and developing nations was subsiding and that he trusted Americans to understand the speech. "I do not think they will read the Mark Malloch Brown statement as insulting, condescending or rude," he said. But Mr. Bolton was unrelenting. "I can tell you that criticism of the intelligence of the American people is never a smart thing to do politically," he said. "And I do believe that the comments have had a negative impact politically and that impact continues," he said. "I'm not trying to dwell on it, I just think it's a fact of life, and if you don't realize it, you're blinking reality in Washington." Posted by: ryuge 2006-06-16 |
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