-- Forwarded message --
Date: Mon, 21 Sep 1998 10:49:20 -0400
From: Tori Holt <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: NY TIMES: Darkest Hour at U.N. For Richest Deadbeat
The New York Times
September 21, 1998, Monday, Late Edition - Final
Section A; Page 6; Column 1; Foreign Desk
Darkest Hour at U.N. For Richest Deadbeat
By BARBARA CROSSETTE
UNITED NATIONS, Sept. 18 --In the annals of American relations with the
United Nations, supporters and critics of the organization broadly agree,
there has never been a more dismal moment than this.
When President Clinton, personally tarnished by the Monica Lewinsky
scandal, speaks here on Monday, he will face an organization that is
likely to strip the United States of its General Assembly vote by the end
of this year for nonpayment of dues. Washington owes the organization
more than $1.5 billion.
Mr. Clinton, the political heir to Presidents Roosevelt and Truman -- who
fought to create a strong United Nations and give it Washington's firm
bipartisan support -- is now viewed by many diplomats and officials here
as too weak or unwilling to battle a hostile Congress to preserve that
pivotal American role.
And the United States is now without a chief representative to the
organization since the departure of Bill Richardson and Republican
blocking of Richard C. Holbrooke's appointment as his successor.
The organization's largest contributor is now Japan, which kept its dues
payments up to date despite a recession. What is helping keep the United
Nations afloat -- barely -- is that the Japanese, Europeans and some
developing countries have not been reimbursed for providing peacekeeping
troops, allowing the money to be applied instead to the operating budget.
"People are furious -- our allies are furious," said Alvin P. Adams, a
former ambassador who is president of the United Nations Association of
the United States, an advocacy and research organization with chapters
around the country.
Mr. Adams' organization, known as UNA-USA, recently announced poll
results showing that a growing percentage of Americans approve of the
United Nations and want the United States to pay its overdue assessments,
without conditions. Eighty percent of those polled opposed linking the
payments to anti-abortion restrictions on international family planning
groups, as Congress has done.
In the UNA-USA survey, conducted Aug. 21 to 25 by Wirthlin Worldwide, 72
percent of 1,005 adults said it was "very important" that the United
States remain an active member of the United Nations, which they ranked
higher than NATO, the World Bank and the World Health Organization.
Seventy-three percent said Washington should pay its dues.
Sixty percent of those surveyed also said the United Nations was doing a
good job, the highest rating UNA-USA has seen in a variety of polls since
1959. Contrary to what some members of Congress and the Clinton
Administration believe, the poll found that many Americans say that they
would take attitudes toward the United Nations into account when voting
for
members of Congress, although this would not be a major factor.
"These polls have taken a jump in public opinion since we took our last
poll two years ago," said John C. Whitehead, a former Deputy Secretary of
State and chairman of UNA-USA. Speaking at a news conference here on
Thursday, Mr. Whitehead said there has long been a "some kind of
disconnect between public opinion on the United Nations and the voting
record of Congress, at least in recent years."
The new poll also found a much higher approval rating for Secretary
General Kofi Annan -- although 25 percent of those polled had never heard
of him -- than a similar poll in late 1995 found for his predecessor,
Boutros Boutros-Ghali, whose name had become the butt of Republican
ridicule. Mr. Annan's performance was given a 53 percent approval rating
compared with Mr. Boutros-Ghali's 30 percent.
Mr. Adams said Mr. Annan's political skills and personable approach to
Americans is probably helping improve the image of the United Nations in
the United States.
"He's has a sense of the politics of the public that it's hard to think
of any other Secretary General who's had that," Mr. Adams said in an
interview. "Some of the good movement in public opinion about the U.N. is
due to the fact that there is a face now, a face that is warm and
approachable, and people identify with him."
But even Mr. Annan has become disillusioned with Washington, as
protestations of support for the United Nations in the Administration and
Congress fail repeatedly to turn into tangible support.
In order to avoid losing its General Assembly vote, the United States
will have to pay about $200 million by Dec. 31. But even if Congress,
which is locked in a confrontation with President Clinton over an
anti-abortion amendment to legislation, is able to authorize the money in
the current session, dozens of conditions, some requiring Administr
