UN Foundation President Timothy E. Wirth Issues Statement on

Washington, D.C.—United Nations Foundation (UN Foundation) President Timothy E. Wirth issued the following statement on President Bush’s speech before the United Nations General Assembly and U.S. funding for the peacekeeping mission in Darfur:

“This morning, President Bush admonished the UN to ‘live up to its promise to promptly deploy peacekeeping forces to Darfur.’ However, the Administration has requested funding for only 20% of its share of the Darfur mission, and is heading towards a debt of more than $1 billion for UN peacekeeping overall. It is impossible for the UN to ‘live up to its promise’ to deploy peacekeepers to Darfur if nations like the United States fail to pay for the peacekeeping missions that they vote for in the Security Council.

“The hybrid UN-AU mission to Darfur will be the most complex, difficult, and expensive peacekeeping mission ever conducted. The U.S. has worked with other nations to ensure that an international force can stem the horrendous violence in the region. The UN has responded and the Secretary General’s diplomatic efforts will allow the UN to lead a force of 26,000 peacekeepers into Darfur to address the violence. The United States should now live up to its own word and fund the Darfur and other UN peacekeeping missions.

“The UN Foundation and its advocacy arm, the Better World Campaign, urge President Bush to address the massive funding shortfalls to UN peacekeeping to ensure the mission in Darfur has the resources it needs to deploy quickly. We hope this process will begin in the supplemental funding request that the Administration will soon submit to Congress. Between peacekeeping and regular budget arrears, the U.S. is in danger of owing an unprecedented $2 billion to the United Nations. More broadly, we urge the Administration and Congress to work towards paying down remaining U.S. arrears so that the U.S. can honor its commitments to the international community and continue to benefit from international burden-sharing through the UN.”