Free Republic

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...

Since the chief antagonist of Paul Wolfowitz on the matter of the settlement is Ad Melkert then head of the World Bank's Ethics Committee, readers might be interested in knowing what he is up to now. From the Inner City Press: UN sources continue to express surprise that Mr. Melkert's hiring of Eelco Keij, an operative from his political party, the Dutch Labor Party, has not triggered any formal review by UNDP or its Executive Board. And beyond direct personal conflicts of interest, these UN insiders enumerate Mr. Melkert's incongruous talk but no action on issues of ethics at UNDP...

A leading Dutch politician who has called for returning European ambassadors from Tel Aviv is the sole candidate to become the Netherlands board member of the World Bank representing also Israel at the prestigious financial institution in Washington. According to Dutch newspapers, the new Dutch government has agreed to appoint Ad Melkert, a former prime-ministerial candidate, as its representative to the board of the World Bank. The Dutch delegate acts also as the representative of Israel and several other countries which are not entitled to appoint board members. Melkert, who led the Dutch Labor Party (PvdA) to one of its...