The United States would consider cutting back on its dues if the
United Nations failed to conduct reforms by the end of this year,
US Ambassador John Bolton said on Monday.
Bolton made the remarks in response to a question after
addressing a symposium on the future of the United Nations
sponsored by the Hudson Institute.
"Is good management and lack of corruption too much to ask for?"
he asked, saying the world body was "severely challenged from a
management and accountability point of view."
Washington, which now pays about a quarter of the UN budget, had
set a goal of "complete concentration on the reform process"
through the end of 2006, said the ambassador.
"So I think what we need to do is wait until we reach the end of
the year and then make an evaluation. And I think our determination
and our objectives are very clear to all of the other UN members,
and I think they can calculate the stakes if reform does not
succeed," he added.
In naming Bolton as his UN ambassador last year, US President
George W. Bush asked him to lead a major overhaul of the United
Nations following findings of widespread mismanagement and
corruption in the oil-for-food program for Iraq.
The oil-for-food operation, which began in December 1996 and
ended in 2003, was aimed at easing the impact of UN sanctions on
ordinary Iraqis, imposed after Saddam Hussein's troops invaded
Kuwait in 1990.
(Xinhua News Agency September 12, 2006)
