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Corruption report released about UN

A report probing the United Nations` oil-for-food program in Iraq has concluded that either the UN must address the management flaws that allowed shortcomings to fester, or the world`s premier international organization could lose what legitimacy it has in addressing global security challenges. The current report comes just as the 191 member countries of the UN are debating a set of reforms to be taken up at an unprecedented international summit at the UN next week. The findings, which were issued Wednesday, follow more than a year`s investigation into the ambitious UN effort to aid the Iraqi people and stifle the regime of Saddam Hussein. The report sets out a list of reforms - such as creating a position of chief operating officer and a strong new independent auditing board - to avoid the kind of corruption and big-bureaucracy inefficiencies that marked the $64 billion program. It cites past UN officials and Security Council members, including Russia and France, for allowing conditions that permitted corruption to deepen over the program`s seven-year life span. It faults the US for overlooking the smuggling of Iraqi oil into Iraq`s neighboring countries, including Jordan. What remains in the balance now is whether the oil-for-food spotlight will shine the way to necessary changes or make an already difficult road impossible for the embattled organization and its officials. In addition, the report casts a shadow over UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan as he has sought a broad vision of UN reform, and it raises doubts over whether he will be able to hold on through his term, which ends in December 2006.