AP IMPACT: UN cuts back on investigating fraud

AP IMPACT: UN cuts back on investigating fraud

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UNITED NATIONS (AP) -- The United Nations has cut back sharply on investigations into corruption and fraud within its ranks, shelving cases involving the possible theft or misuse of millions of dollars, an Associated Press review has found.

At least five major cases in Afghanistan, Iraq and Africa are among the inquiries halted as the U.N. scaled back on self-policing over the past year.

The world body was rocked earlier in the decade when more than 2,200 companies from some 40 countries colluded with Saddam Hussein's regime to bilk $1.8 billion from a U.N.-administered oil-for-food pr

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honestly,I am every day amazed at the behaviour of the U.N.
On one hand they are trying to control and police the entire world,and make us all trot to whatever theme of the day they decide to enforce upon us, and yet here they are, blatantly removing the very tools that keep their own bed clean of corruption;
one rule for them, another for us it appears.
How long are people just going to dumbly watch and not call out all these dualities in existence in our world at leadership level?!
Why have we given up control of our powers of analysis and critical thinking, and stopped participating in the direction of our own lives?

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(visit the link for the full news article)

[edit on 12/1/10 by asIam]

[edit on 12/1/10 by asIam]

Even if everyone did think critically and was aware of what was going on and cared, what then?

People love to argue and complain and there are many arm chair revolutionaries but a lot of us humans fail in the first principal of affecting change.

You must be the change you want to see. It is not enough to ask others to wake up when we ourselves will still play into the system for fear of all we would have to scarifice if we simply stopped participating. Starving the beast will have a reaction and probably not a good one.

I don;t know many people that would be willing to suffer intentionally and then suffer some more as the leaders of society strike out.

If everyone tomorrow stopped going to work and did so for a month we would have no access to health care or heating or food. Some people may have some or even all of those things but not enough for everyone. We are far to dependent nowadays, like a parasite that wants to kill the host but needs it for survival.

I'd love to see the U.N held accountable as I would my own government and coporate instituitons and all that jazz but I am still only one person and my outlet is an internet forum through a connection I pay for, on a computer I bought, using energy I have no control over.

Its a conundrum I can't see a solution to.

Cheers

I was trying to edit above to add in Angela Kane's(UN management chief) comment, but it wouldn't go for some reason.
Here it is :

"The investigations division, I am convinced, is doing a very good job, and is continuing the good work," U.N. management chief Angela Kane said in late October. She repeated the assertion last week.

quote

"I am convinced she says! ha
sounds like someone who hasn't a clue what's going on in her own offices.

But the U.N.'s track record over the past year suggests otherwise: - Nothing has come of a task force report completed in December 2008 that found $1 million a day flowing out of a safe in a U.N. project office in Kabul - part of $850 million intended for Afghanistan's rebuilding and elections between 2002 and 2006. A year later, U.N. managers say the case is still under review. - Task force staff ran out of time before they could complete two more investigations on Afghanistan. One involved evidence that a U.S. firm padded its charges by $1 million and the other that U.N. staff diverted millions of dollars from Afghan elections, roads, schools and hospitals, according to U.N. documents and officials. Task force investigators found evidence some of the money went to expand U.N. operations in Africa, Asia and the Middle East without authorization. And they found no documentation to confirm how the Kabul office used tens of millions of dollars meant to promote democratic elections in Afghanistan. - No action has been taken on a task force finding that about half of $350,000 in U.N. funds intended to launch a radio station for women in Baghdad was used to pay off personal loans, a mortgage, credit card bills and taxes, as well as for cash withdrawals from a bank in Jordan. The task force recommended disciplining a U.N. staff member and referring the case to national prosecutorial authorities. Neither has happened. - A task force investigation of collusion and bid-rigging involving a transport company in Africa found contracts steered to one company and two of its senior officers. The task force recommended the case be prosecuted; nothing has happened. U.N. managers say the case is under review.

]source

reply to post by thebulldog



"Even if everyone did think critically and was aware of what was going on and cared, what then? "

hi Bulldog, well that's easy....we'd all be standing pointing and laughing shouting "Look the Emperor wears no clothes" and with the blind faith we place in "authority" to look after us dissolved, down will come the ivory tower, all the kings soldiers and all.
Just look at the carnation revolution in Portugal in the 70's for an example of how it could proceed.
carnation revolution

I might have to log off for a bit, sorry,windows update has me struggling to post just now,best restart and get it over with .
stupid automatic updates!