U.S. To Pay Up

The Senate voted Wednesday to release $582 million in dues owed the United Nations as part of a deal pushed by Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Jesse Helms to reduce the U.S. share of U.N. operating and peacekeeping costs.

Helms, R-N.C., a longtime critic of financial support for the United Nations, gave his blessings to the funding. "U.N. member states have come a long way on reforms and fairer assessment scales," Helms said.

Sen. Joseph Biden, D-Del., ranking Democrat on the Foreign Relations Committee, praised the conservative Helms for his tenacity in linking U.S. payments to U.N. reforms. "Just as only Nixon could go to China, only Helms could fix the U.N.," Biden said.

The 99-0 roll call, the Senate's first legislative vote of the new Congress, sends the bill to the House.

Helms and Biden crafted legislation in 1999 under which the United States would pay $926 million in U.N. dues if the organization streamlined its bureaucracy and reduced America's share of U.N. operating and peacekeeping costs.

In December 1999, the United States paid the first $100 million of that amount, needed to stave off suspension of U.S. voting rights in the U.N. General Assembly. The third portion of $244 million would be paid next year if the United Nations follows through on the agreement, including implementing budgetary improvements at the World Health Organization, International Labor Organization and other U.N. bodies.

Last December, in the first financial overhaul of the regular U.N. budget in 28 years, the General Assembly agreed that the U.S. share of the operating budget would drop from 25 percent to 22 percent and its share of the peacekeeping budget would be reduced gradually from 31 percent to 26.5 percent in 2003.

Key to reaching the deal was a one-time gift of $34 million offered by American media tycoon Ted Turner to cover the shortfall in the main U.N. budget created by the reduced U.S. contribution in 2001.

Helms said the peacekeeping share was still above the 25 percent cap set by Congress in 1994, but the deal would save American taxpayers some $170 million a year.

In Foreign Relations Committee debate on the legislation Wednesday, Sen. Richard Lugar, R-Ind., urged Congress to consider lifting that 1994 cap so the United States will not build up more debt in the future.

He said about two-thirds of the money owed is for peacekeeping operations being undertaken in large part by U.S. allies because of American reluctance to send troops to foreign countries to enforce or monitor peace agreements.

Biden said he would seek to lift the cap in this year's foreign affairs bill. He said Secretary of State Colin Powell had told him he favors lifting the cap and paying the $77 million in new arrears that would accrue this year.

Helms said the United States should not pay for more than a quarter of peacekeeping operations, however, and he would oppose suca move.

The United Nations contends that, even with payment of the full $926 million, the United States still will owe $500 million, mainly because the United States has paid only 25 percent of peacekeeping missions rather than the 31 percent billed by the United Nations. There's little support in Congress for that argument.

By JIM ABRAMS
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