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Top U.N. Official Threatens ‘Retaliation' Against State Dept.
By BENNY AVNI
New York Sun
June 15, 2007
UNITED NATIONS — A top executive of the U.N. development arm threatened "retaliation" against a State Department official this week even though America, the top financier of the agency, pays $100 million of its annual budget.
In Washington, meanwhile, a new piece of legislation introduced in Congress yesterday set reform benchmarks for the United Nations to achieve — or else risk the withdrawal of American funds. Along with growing disenchantment with the human-rights system, these developments raise the possibility of a new chill in relations between Washington and Turtle Bay.
In a strongly worded letter to the administrator of the United Nations Development Program, Kemal Dervis, Mr. Khalilzad expressed "surprise" and "concern" at the threats made by the UNDP second in command, Ad Melkert, toward an American U.N. ambassador, Mark Wallace.
A new batch of allegations, including the financing of a Pyongyang's purchase of items that could be used in advanced weapons systems, was reported in several newspapers this week. Spokesmen for the agency told reporters that the allegations were unsupported by documentation.
On Wednesday, Mr. Wallace presented Mr. Melkert with a batch of documents, including names of Korean companies involved in the relevant UNDP transactions, and the dollar amount and dates of the agency's payments to those companies. Mr. Wallace was accompanied in the meeting at the UNDP headquarters by another American official, and with Mr. Melkert was one of his aides, according to a source familiar with the meeting.
"I was surprised and concerned to learn" that during the meeting " Mr. Melkert suggested to Ambassador Wallace that UNDP viewed United States inquiry relating to such new information as justifying some kind of ‘retaliation' against the Government of the United States," Mr. Khalilzad wrote to Mr. Dervis yesterday.
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