U.S. Finally Investigates U.N.

With an annual $8 billion contribution of American taxpayer money, the U.S. government was long overdue to investigate and clean up the rampant corruption and misuse of funds at the United Nations.

Thanks to the efforts of a prominent lawmaker and the release of a scathing congressional report, federal authorities are finally investigating the ongoing wrongdoing at the international agency already renowned for its corrupt secretary general, Kofi Anan, and the secret multi-million dollar deals he secured for his son, Kojo.

The investigative Government Accountability Office didn’t have to publish a lengthy report to expose already well-documented problems at the U.N., but apparently that’s what it took to motivate the U.S. Attorney’s office to launch an investigation into the agency. The lengthy report finds deep flaws in management, coordination and oversight in the U.N. peacekeeping operations and says U.N. resources are unnecessarily vulnerable to mismanagement, waste, fraud and abuse.

Illinois Republican Congressman Henry Hyde, also House International Affairs Committee chairman, has been saying this for years and was heavily criticized last month for threatening to withhold U.S. money to the United Nations unless changes were made.

Hyde was one of the few lawmakers who didn’t settle for an obviously biased report from the U.N. watchdog known as the Office of Internal Oversight Services, which is funded by the same body it investigates. This obviously compromises the validity of any so-called investigation.

News By Us writes that that the U.N. has evolved into an ineffective, unaccountable body bloated with bureaucratic egos that offer unenforceable and hollow resolutions. Hyde’s reform ultimatum is also complimented because it offered hope before the politicos on Capitol Hill watered it down.