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U.N. to launch audit of procurement office
The top U.N. management official said Wednesday he has ordered a new investigation of the procurement division in light of a senior officer's guilty plea for taking massive bribes from United Nations contractors. The review by Christopher Burnham will add to the extraordinary level of scrutiny on the procurement department, which first gained serious attention over its involvement in the scandal-tainted U.N. oil-for-food program. It was thrust into the spotlight again, when one of its staff, Alexander Yakovlev pleaded guilty in federal court to three counts of money laundering, wire fraud and conspiracy to commit wire fraud, in part for soliciting bribes from U.N. contractors. He was believed to have taken at least $950,000.
''I am compelled to begin my own review and audit to make sure we are doing everything humanly possible to prevent this from happening in the future,'' Burnham told The Associated Press. While Yakovlev has been implicated in a separate investigation of the oil-for-food program, the bribes he acknowledged taking fell outside the operation. That has led to fears that corruption within the procurement department may have been more widespread than previously thought. Burnham, undersecretary-general for management, said in an interview that the new review was necessary because the United Nations had already sought for months to straighten out his department, including with an audit ordered in spring. Mark Malloch Brown, chief of staff to U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan, said Monday that the outside audit had found several shortcomings and the United Nations would enact several of its recommendations. ''It is deeply disturbing to think that after all the effort that has gone into reforming the procurement process that we could still have corruption in its ranks,'' Burnham said.
One goal of the new investigation would be to find out what the U.N. needs to do ''to ensure that member states can have complete faith in the integrity'' of the procurement division, Burnham said. There are already several investigations of procurement, making it one of the most analyzed divisions of the United Nations. The internal U.N. watchdog, the Office of Internal Oversight Services, had uncovered some of the initial evidence about Yakovlev and is pursuing allegations that other staff may have violated U.N. procurement rules, a U.N. official said.''The investigation is on him and whoever else helped him in the procurement department,'' said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not specifically authorized to discuss the subject. A U.N.-backed inquiry of the Iraq oil-for-food program has touched on its work, censuring some of its officials, including Yakovlev. That probe, led by former U.S. Federal Reserve Chairman Paul Volcker, expects to finish its work later this year. And the U.S. Attorney's Office in New York, which filed the charges against Yakovlev, is investigating criminal wrongdoing by U.N. staff including those who worked in procurement. Burnham, a former U.S. Marine whose previous job was chief financial officer at the State Department, was appointed in May. Yakovlev resigned just days after Burnham took office in June when allegations came to light that he may have helped his son get a job with a company that did business with the United Nations. Annan told reporters he planned to meet Burnham later to talk about making sure the Yakovlev case doesn't happen again. ''I think we are taking very active measures to ensure that we do not have any more bad apples in that department,'' Annan said.
Source : Associated Press (AP)