US regains seat on UN budget committee

UNITED NATIONS, Nov. 5 (UPI) The United States regained Friday its seat on the important Advisory Committee on Administration and Budgetary Questions at the United Nations after a two-year absence.

Congressional leaders demanded restoration to the 16-member panel as a prerequisite for paying the more than $1.5 billion debt to the United Nations.

The U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations, Richard Holbrooke, said he was "enormously gratified" at the election results and was personally notifying Senate Foreign Relations Chairman Jesse Helms of the victory by telephone.

"In regaining our seat on the Budget Committee, we have accomplished one of the most important benchmarks established" by Congress for the payment of arrears, Holbrooke said.

He said the move sends a signal to Congress that the U.N. member states are "eager for American leadership in the United Nations."

Holbrooke then expressed hope that the enabling Helms-Biden Bill would be approved in the House of Representatives "and enacted into law." He said this was "a legislative action that is profoundly important to our national security."

"The executive branch rightly did this, led by President Clinton who initiated the effort during his trip to New Zealand," Holbrooke told reporters after the vote by acclamation.

But Holbrooke and Secretary of State Madeleine Albright also should be credited for helping to convince New Zealand not to seek another term on the committee and opening the door to the United States.

He said the United States would be represented at the committee by Susan Shearouse, a counselor at the U.S. Mission to the United Nations specializing in financial matters.

Also elected Friday to three-year terms on the committee effective Jan. 1, 2000, were representatives of Cameroon, Cuba, France, and Russia.

But just getting on the committee does not mean the back-due funds will be flowing into the world organization from Capitol Hill.

Some of the other "benchmarks," as Holbrooke refers to them, are a no-growth budget for the United Nations, which has been the case of recent years, and the more difficult reduction in dues and peacekeeping assessments.

Washington wants its U.N. dues shaved from 25 percent to 22 percent of the U.N. budget and its assessments for peacekeeping operations lowered from 31 percent to 25 percent.

By the end of the year the United States has to pay the United Nations $550 million, only $200 million of which is in the pipeline, or it will lose its vote in the General Assembly.

Its vote in the Security Council would not be affected.