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Reuters: Biden Wants Congress to Pay Arrears to U.N.

News Article

Date: May 21, 2007
Issues: Foreign Affairs Government Budget and Spending


Reuters: Biden Wants Congress to Pay Arrears to U.N.

By Evelyn Leopold

U.S. Sen. Joseph Biden said on Monday he was pushing Congress to pay U.S. arrears to the United Nations and lift a unilaterally imposed spending cap on U.N. peacekeeping operations.

Biden, a Delaware Democrat who heads the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, led a bipartisan delegation to the United Nations for discussions on a variety of subjects, including Sudan, Lebanon, Kosovo and U.N. reforms.

"The timetable is immediate," Biden told reporters. "We would try to pass it for this fiscal year."
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The U.N. General Assembly, after negotiations with Congress by former U.S. Ambassador Richard Holbrooke, agreed in 2000 to drop the U.S. assessment for peacekeeping gradually from 30 percent to nearly 27 percent.

But despite the deal, the former Republican-dominated Congress refused to remove a prior spending cap of 25 percent on peacekeeping dues, which U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon Ban said cost the United Nations $150 million to $200 million a year.

"The important point is to deal with the 27 percent cap," to make sure "we don't further create arrearages as we move forward," Biden said.

As of December 31, the United States owed the United Nations $677 million for peacekeeping operations and $291 million for the administrative budget, according to U.N. figures.

The United States usually operates on a different set of numbers and it is doubtful Congress would pay all the monies accumulated under the 25 percent cap.

U.N. payments are assessed according to a nation's wealth, and the United States has had its dues for peacekeeping and a separate assessment for the regular U.N. administrative budget lowered several times over the last decade.

The estimated U.N. peacekeeping budget is about $5 billion in the fiscal year ending June 30. The Bush administration has proposed spending $1.13 billion for U.N. peacekeeping in 2007.

For the U.N. regular administrative budget of $2.1 billion annually, the United States is assessed $493.2 million due this year, in addition to the $291 million in arrears.

The Holbrooke deal lowered the dues amount from 25 percent to 22 percent for the regular budget.


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