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General Assembly Adopts New Contribution Scale
The United Nations General Assembly Saturday unanimously adopted the first major overhaul of its financing in 27 years and approved a resolution that lowered U.S. contribution from 25 percent to 22 percent.
But the 189-member General Assembly said that U.S. dues could be bumped back in 2003 if the world's richest nation does not pay its arrears with the world body, which the U.N. estimates at more than US$1.3 billion, by then.
The first resolution authorizes the reduction of U.S. payments to the United Nations, but it shifts most of the financial burden to developing countries. In a second resolution, the General Assembly revised, for the first time since 1973, the contribution scale for its peacekeeping operations budget.
The two resolutions were passed by consensus, without vote.
In a statement issued after the passage of the resolutions, U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan called the agreement "the best possible seasonal gift" for the United Nations, saying that it should "remove a major source of tension" in the world body.
"In particular, we can now look forward to a normal and constructive relationship with the United States Administration," he said.
"The United Nations now can begin the new century on a firmer financial footing, and we can focus our energies on our true task, which is to advance the principles and purposes of the United Nations," he said. "We must now concentrate on responding to the needs and expectations of our peoples."
The General Assembly approves resolutions enshrining separate budgets for the U.N. day-to-day operations and its far-flung peacekeeping operations.
The two resolutions were adopted after a night of hard-nosed negotiations, during which the 189 U.N. member states overcome the last obstacles standing in the way of an agreement lowering U.S. dues to the international organization, diplomats said.
The formal acceptance of a reduction in U.S. dues to the United Nations was delayed again Saturday morning after months of intense talks at the Fifth Committee of the General Assembly, which is in charge of administrative and budgetary affairs.
South Korea did an about-face at the last minute, refusing an 85 percent hike in its dues, currently set at US$10.5 million, diplomats said.
In order to break the deadlock, U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright and Richard Holbrooke, the U.S. permanent representative to the United Nations, spoke to South Korean Foreign Minister Lee Joung-binn, American diplomats said.
U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan was also telephoning South Korean President Kim Dae-jung, U.N. officials said.
The general U.N. budget, which is covered by the dues from its member states, totals slightly more than US$1 billion a year. The peacekeeping budget, toward which the richer countries pay a dispassionately larger share than their dues assessment, exceeds US$3 billion a year, Eckhard said.
The increase in U.S. payments to the U.N. were deferred until 2002 after U.S. media mogul Ted Turner volunteered to provide US$34 million to make up the difference between old U.S. contribution level and the new in the first year.
The United States currently owes the world body more than US$1.5 billion, having given itself a unilateral deduction in payments over the last few years.
The United Nations, the largest intergovernmental organization in the world, relies fully on the member states to finance its various operations, from administration to peacekeeping missions. But the world body does not allow individuals to pay a government' s debts.
However, Washington permits gifts earmarked for special purposes, with the approval of Congress.
Diplomats here commented privately that while the Turner contribution was an ingenious idea, it was embarrassing for an individual to bail out the world's richest nation.
Holbrooke, who for nine months has been caught between a hostile Congress and nations angry at the U.S. debt, wants to settle the controversy before U.S. President Bill Clinton leaves office in mid-January.
The new administration of President-elect George W. Bush is known to want the issue out of the way soon.
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