United Nations

President Obama entered office vowing to fully pay U.S. dues to international organizations, but his administration's efforts to do so have hit a snag: Tom Coburn.

Today comes word that the State Department is circulating a memo on Capitol Hill opposing a measure by the Oklahoma Senator that would shift funds currently designated for U.S. contributions to the United Nations for new benefits for American veterans.

The document points out that the U.S. has just finally paid its back bill owed to the U.N. after 10 years of being in arrears.

"The full payment of assessed contributions affects the standing and influence that the U.S. has at these organizations," the State Department memo reads. "As we call upon others to help reform and strengthen the UN, the United States must do its part -- and pay its bills."

Foggy Bottom is just the latest actor to be roped into Coburn's ongoing feud with Veterans' Affairs Committee Chairman Daniel Akaka, D-HI, over Akaka's bill to authorize money for family caregivers tending to injured soldiers returning home from Iraq and Afghanistan and other new benefits that the Congressional Budget Office estimates will cost $3.7 billion. Akaka's bill has wide support, but Coburn has been holding it up as part of his promise to oppose any bill that isn't specifically paid for in advance.

The fight got dramatic last week when Akaka held a press conference to criticize Coburn's intransigence and Coburn showed up and sat in the front row. Coburn waved smugly at Akaka during the event and then got up and held his own impromptu presser to defend his position. Senate Democrats were not amused.

Late Tuesday, the Democrats and Republicans came to an agreement to vote on the bill, including a separate vote on Coburn's amendment.

"Paying for veterans' benefits is a cost of war; this is not the appropriate place or time for a debate about the United Nations," Akaka's spokesman Jesse Broder Van Dyke told The Cable. "Diplomacy can prevent wars so we shouldn't shortchange that. Our veterans shouldn't be used as pawns in that debate."

Coburn spokesman John Hart disagreed. "Dr. Coburn hopes his colleagues will put the needs of our wounded veterans ahead of the wishes of corrupt bureaucrats at the United Nations," he told The Cable.

The vote on Coburn's amendment will probably come tomorrow.

The House is preparing to vote on a resolution condemning the U.N.'s Goldstone Report, but not before making changes to the text to respond to the complaints of Goldstone himself.

Meanwhile in New York, the U.N. General Assembly was preparing for a possible vote on a resolution supporting the Goldstone Report on Wednesday and Arab U.N. delegations were circulating a draft today.

The Congressional resolution, which simply expresses the opinion of Congress and has no actual force of law, deems the report "irredeemably biased and unworthy of further consideration or legitimacy," and "calls on the President and the Secretary of State to strongly and unequivocally oppose any further consideration of the [report] and any other measures stemming from this report in multilateral fora."

Sponsored by House Foreign Affairs heads Howard Berman, D-CA, and Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, R-FL, the measure is expected to pass by a wide margin.

Justice Richard Goldstone, the primary author of the report, wrote a lengthy memorandum to the bill's sponsors criticizing the text of the House resolution. In a dear colleague letter circulated Monday, Berman and Gary Ackerman, D-NY, responded to each of Goldstone's complaints.

Chief among them was the issue of whether the U.N. Human Rights Council issued a mandate for the report that prejudged Israel's guilt in alleged war crimes committed during the Gaza operation. Berman and Ackerman rejected Goldstone's contention that he altered the mandate to include the examination of rocket attacks on Israel in addition to Israeli actions in Gaza.

"The broadened mandate Justice Goldstone sought was discussed, but not voted on, at an UNHRC plenary session. It was then announced via a press release in an altered formation, more restrictive than the formulation envisioned by Justice Goldstone," Berman and Ackerman wrote.

"Even though Justice Goldstone made earnest efforts to alter the mandate, he did not fully succeed ... we intend to alter the resolution to take account of Justice Goldstone's effort."

UPDATE: As expected, the House overwhelmingly passed the measure, with 344 members voting for, 36 voting against, and 22 voting "present."

Here are the new test portions of the resolution added before passage:

Whereas Justice Richard Goldstone, who chaired the `United Nations Fact Finding Mission on the Gaza Conflict,' told the then-President of theUNHRC, Nigerian Ambassador Martin Ihoeghian Uhomoibhi, that he intended to broaden the mandate of the Mission to include "all violations of international human rights law and international humanitarian law that might have been committed at any time in the context of the military operations that were conducted in Gaza during the period from 27 December 2008 and 18 January 2009, whether before, during or after," a phrase that, according to Justice Goldstone, was intended to allow him to investigate Hamas attacks on Israeli civilians;

Whereas Ambassador Uhomoibhi issued a statement on April 3, 2009, that endorsed part of Justice Goldstone's proposed broadened mandate but deleted the phrase "before, during, and after," and added inflammatory
anti-Israeli language;

Whereas a so-called broadened mandate was never officially endorsed by a plenary meeting of the UNHRC, neither in the form proposed by Justice Goldstone nor in the form proposed by Ambassador Uhomoibhi;

And this clause has been expanded, so it now reads that resolution:

calls on the President and the Secretary of State to continue to strongly and unequivocally oppose any endorsement of the `Report of the United Nations Fact Finding Mission on the Gaza Conflict' in multilateral fora, including through leading opposition to any United Nations General Assembly resolution and through vetoing, if necessary, any United Nations Security Council resolution that endorses the contents of this report, seeks to act upon the recommendations contained in this report, or calls on any other international body to take further action regarding this report.

Amb. Peter Galbraith, who was recently fired from his job as the second-highest ranking U.N. official in Afghanistan, admitted Thursday that he had financial interests in Kurdish oil dealings at the time he was helping to craft the Iraqi constitution.

Galbraith has been under pressure to talk about his dealings regarding the Norwegian oil company DNO, which had been part of an agreement to develop Kurdistan oil fields beginning in 2004. The Kurdistan Regional Government's own dealings with DNO are controversial in and of themselves.

Last month the KRG temporarily suspended DNO's operations in the Kurdish areas to allow time to settle a dispute between DNO and the Oslo Stock Exchange. The exchange suspended trading on DNO stock after it was revealed that the KRG aided in the selling of DNO stock to the Turkish company Genel, in what some see as an example of insider trading.

But Galbraith's involvement with DNO dates back to 2004, when he was actively involved in helping the new Iraqi government sort out its structure in the aftermath of the U.S. invasion. Galbraith pushed hard for the Kurds to seek maximum autonomy at the time, but now denies there was any conflict of interest.

"The business interest, including my investment into Kurdistan, was consistent with my political views,'' he told the Boston Globe, "These were all things that I was promoting, and in fact, have brought considerable benefit to the people of Kurdistan, the Kurdistan oil industry, and also to shareholders.''

The Globe also has details of how Galbraith was playing both the political and financial sides of the Kurdish issue:

In speeches, meetings with US officials, and articles in the New York Review of Books, Galbraith said Kurds should be given maximum autonomy and should have the right to develop their own oil fields, free of control by Iraq's central government.

But the same time, Galbraith was quietly entering into business deals that gave him a financial stake in the positions he was advocating. In late 2003 and early 2004, he worked as a paid consultant to Kurdish politicians, advising them on legal language they should seek to insert into Iraqi laws to keep future oil development under their control. Later, in 2005, he advised them again on an unpaid basis.

On June 23, 2004, Galbraith and his son, Andrew, registered a Delaware partnership called Porcupine, which entered into a business arrangement with DNO, a Norwegian oil company, according to company documents and a statement recently circulated by Porcupine.

Two days after Porcupine was established, the Kurdistan Regional Government signed a contract to develop Kurdistan's first oil field with DNO, ushering in a potential economic windfall for the semiautonomous region. DNO eventually struck oil, and currently owns a 55 percent stake in the Tawke field.

Many also see the revelations of Galbraith's involvement in DNO, which were detailed in a harsh manner on the Norwegian Web site historiae.org, as part of a retribution campaign following Galbraith's public and scathing criticism of his former U.N. boss Kai Eide, the Norwegian diplomat who stands accused of helping to ignore massive election fraud in Afghanistan.

AFP/Getty Images

Former Ambassador Peter Galbraith, who was removed today as the second highest ranking U.N. official in Afghanistan, gives a behind the scenes account of his dismissal in an interview with The Cable.

Chiefly, he blames his former longtime friend and boss Kai Eide, the U.N.'s top official in Kabul, for demanding that the U.N. remove Galbraith after differences between them over how to handle fraud in the Afghan elections spilled over into the press.

"Basically, it's my understanding that Kai told the U.N. leadership 'he goes or I go,'" Galbraith said, adding "It was clear that Kai had been lobbying strongly against my return" to Afghanistan after Galbraith took a leave from his post there earlier this month.

Galbraith was surprised to hear he had been sacked, especially since he and Eide had agreed on a specific time he would return to Afghanistan and because he had not been told anything and had to call in to the U.N. undersecretary general for peacekeeping to learn of his dismissal.

Eide, who long ago had introduced Galbraith to his wife, turned on him after their long running and multi-faceted dispute over how to handle the fraud discovered in the election became a public issue.

"He's hyper sensitive against the press coverage," Galbraith said of Eide, "And at some point he decided he had enough of me and he wanted me gone."

Although the differences between the two were many, he said, one key difference was over how to handle what Galbraith calls "ghost polling centers," mostly in the southern part of the country, where Galbraith said massive fraud took place.

"These ghost polling centers had no pollsters, never opened, but had huge potential for fraud and in fact the fraud took place at these polling centers," Galbraith said.

Additionally, Galbraith alleges that Eide refused to hand over to the electoral complaints commission massive evidence that their staff had collected about actual incidents of vote fraud. Staff was frustrated that their evidence was going to waste after they put themselves at risk to collect it, he said.

Another major dispute was over whether the independent election commission would abandon its published safeguards against fraud in the wake of the disputed election. Galbraith wanted those standards upheld but Afghan President Hamid Karzai protested and Eide sided with Karzai, Galbraith explained.

A senior U.S. diplomat told The Cable that Eide's repeated resistance to stronger anti-fraud measures both before and after the election was because his influence was directly tied to his relationship with Karzai.

"It's a classic case of clientilism," the diplomat said.

Galbraith said that his relationship with Eide broke down in mid September, when Eide returned from a trip away from Afghanistan and determined he and Galbraith weren't on the same page.

"He had no confidence that I would carry out his orders and I had no confidence in his leadership," said Galbraith.

Looking ahead, Galbraith said the U.N. can still play a constructive role in Afghanistan and that the process of examining sample ballots should move forward.

But, Galbraith quickly added, "If you don't have a run-off election, the crisis continues."

There's a massive manhunt underway following a prison break in Iraq.

The White House is starting over with its strategy to close the Guantánamo Bay prison.

The United Nations moved to curb the spread of nuclear weapons.

Allies will confront Iran about a secret nuclear fuel facility.

The new Japanese prime minister speaks English very good!

In which we scour the transcript of the State Department's daily presser so you don't have to. Here are the highlights of today's briefing by spokesman Ian Kelly:

• Hillary Clinton had meetings in New York today with the foreign ministers of South Korea, Czech Republic, Turkmenistan, and Japan. Also meeting with the presidents of Costa Rica and Georgia and participate in a trilateral dialogue with Japan and Australia.

• Obama's trilateral meeting Benjamin Netanyahu and Mahmoud Abbas tomorrow on the sidelines of the U.N. General Assembly may not actually produce any results, but it will "advance our efforts towards our ultimate goal" and "it shows that [Obama] is personally engaged in the effort," Kelly said. The U.N. Security Council meeting will be the first at the head of state level in some time.

• President Manuel Zelaya has returned to Honduras! "All I can say is reiterate our almost daily call on both sides to exercise restraint and refrain from any kind of action that would have any possible outcome in violence," said Kelly, adding "Of course, we believe that he's the democratic -- democratically elected and constitutional leader of Honduras." Senator Jim DeMint, R-S.C., disagrees.

• No comment on reports that the State Department is sitting on 25 visa applications from Iran.

• There are no plans to meet with the North Koreans in any way in New York this week and still no decision about whether Ambassador Stephen Bosworth will accept Kim Jong Il's invitation to travel there.

Susan Rice was one of the top foreign-policy advisors on Barack Obama's presidential campaign. A fierce advocate for her candidate, the former Brookings Institution fellow and Clinton-era assistant secretary of state for African affairs was a frequent presence on cable television and a go-to source of quotes for reporters.

Seven months into the job as Obama's ambassador to the United Nations and a month before the annual U.N. General Assembly opening, Rice plans to deliver a speech Wednesday night at an event cosponsored by New York University's Center for Global Affairs and its Center on International Cooperation. In her address, a Rice advisor tells Foreign Policy, the U.N. ambassador plans to detail how the Obama administration is changing the U.S. relationship with the world, and how, as part of that new direction, it is dramatically altering its approach to the United Nations. In turn, the advisor says, the speech will explain how those changes advance U.S. interests and make Americans safer.

"Today, as we steer a new course at the United Nations, our guiding principles are clear: We value the U.N. as a vehicle for advancing U.S. policies and priorities, and universal values," Rice's prepared remarks state. "We work for change from within rather than criticizing from the sidelines.  We stand firm in defense of America's interests and values, but we don't dissent just to be contrary. We listen to states great and small. We build coalitions. We meet our responsibilities. We pay our bills. We push for real reform. And we remember that in an interconnected world, what's good for others is often good for America as well."

The speech, crafted by Rice and senior policy advisor Warren Bass, echoes those given recently at the six-month mark by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano, and other cabinet heads. Rice will likely further raise her public profile next month when the U.N. General Assembly opens its annual session in New York in September, with the United States presiding over the Security Council for the month.

Since taking the job, Rice has been consumed with responsibilities ranging from U.N. Security Council resolutions on North Korea, to the sentencing Tuesday of Burmese democracy activist Aung San Suu Kyi to 18 months' detention, to a resolution passed last month related to sexual violence, a major subject of Clinton's visit to the Democratic Republic of the Congo this week.

U.S. officials have signaled recently that if Iran hasn't positively responded to the offer to engage on its nuclear program by the General Assembly opening, they plan to start pushing for a harsher set of international sanctions targeting the Islamic Republic -- a push that Rice would likely be a key player in shaping.

Foreign-policy watchers will be looking out for Rice's comments on the situation in Darfur, a subject on which she has long been active.

Rice is scheduled to deliver her address Wednesday at 5:30 p.m. at the Greenberg Lounge in Vanderbilt Hall, NYU School of Law.

UPDATE: Rice's remarks as delivered can be found here.

Alex Wong/Getty Images

The U.S. mission to the United Nations has made several hires. Among those now working for permanent representative Susan Rice:

• Brooke Anderson, chief of staff, who was previously the national security spokeswoman for the Obama-Biden transition and a counterproliferation expert with the Nuclear Threat Initiative
• Mark Kornblau, communications director, who served as a former Hill aide and Kerry campaign veteran
• Kathleen McGlynn, deputy chief of staff, who worked as the deputy chief of staff to Vice President Biden and as chief of staff to the Edwards 2008 presidential campaign

Three political appointees with long expertise in U.N.-related areas:

• Elizabeth Cousens, principal policy advisor, former vice president of the International Peace Academy. Her research has focused on peace agreements and civil war
• Mike Pan, policy advisor, a former special advisor to the U.N.'s chief prosecutor in Sierra Leone and a national security specialist at the Center for American Progress
• Salman Ahmed, policy advisor, a Princeton professor and a former senior political officer in the U.N. office of the undersecretary-general for peacekeeping

Supporting Rice in Washington:

• Erica Barks-Ruggles, deputy to the permanent rep. and director of the Washington office, a former NSC director for Africa and deputy assistant secretary of state for human rights
• Warren Bass, Rice's speechwriter and senior policy advisor, a former Washington Post editor and 9/11 commission staffer
• Jennifer Simon, policy advisor, a former SFRC staffer
• Meridith Webster, deputy chief of staff

Still to be officially named:

• The deputy permanent rep. to the U.N., currently held as is traditional by a career Foreign Service officer, Amb. Alejandro Wolff, whose term has been extended to the summer (a position distinct from deputy to the permanent rep., Barks-Ruggles.)
• The assistant deputy permanent representative for special political affairs, currently filled by Foreign Service officer Amb. Rosemary DiCarlo, who is expected to be succeeded by a political appointee
• The ambassador for economic and social affairs, currently unfilled
• The ambassador for management affairs, also currently not filled