Anti-war video

U.N. coming cleaner? Ban Ki-Moon presses top officials on corruption probes, wants less public disclosure

Beset by scandals surrounding the United Nations Development Program (UNDP), U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has decided to tighten the reins on anti-corruption and ethics investigations across his sprawling organization — even while trying to keep those investigation results from the general public.

The decision by Ban marks a major reversal of course from less than a year ago, when he announced that the U.N. Secretariat “does not enjoy the jurisdiction” over protection of whistle-blowers who expose wrongdoing at UNDP, the U.N.’s development arm, or other agencies in the labyrinthine U.N. system.

At the time, a broad spectrum of U.N. reformers complained that Ban had ceded those powers, as well as the management of anti-corruption probes, to UNDP and its sister agencies, turning a unified anti-corruption system into a jumble of potential conflicts of interest and differing standards.

Since then, UNDP has been hit with a variety of other scandals — including a FOX News investigation last month into UNDP’s procurement of $2.3 million worth of airport scanners for the customs service of the radical Chavez government of Venezuela, which the U.S. manufacturer of the equipment said it never shipped.

Yet another important scandal surfaced last week, when a UNDP whistle-blower demanded an investigation by Ban’s Secretariat into UNDP support for a Somali financial company with ties to terrorist organizations on the U.N.’s own sanctions list. The whistle-blower, Ahmed Ismael, claims that he was fired after bringing the issue to UNDP’s attention. (A UNDP spokesman told news agencies, “Clearly UNDP takes all these allegations extremely seriously and we are in fact investigating them thoroughly.)

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European Parliament moves to curb power of lobbyists

The European Parliament has voted overwhelmingly in favor of tightening rules regulating the 15,000 lobbyists that gravitate around the EU institutions.

By an overwhelming majority, EU lawmakers adopted a report recommending a mandatory public register for lobbyists that seek to influence decisions at the European Union's institutions.

The decision on Thursday ratifies the proposal made by the European Parliament's constitutional affairs committee on Tuesday, April 1, in favor of the compulsory register for the lobbyists working to influence EU policies via the EU assembly, states and the bloc's executive European Commission.

The report, drafted by Finnish conservative MEP Alexander Stubb before he became Finland's foreign minister, also calls for a code of conduct and sanctions for those who flaunt it.

Critics say the lobbyists have held far too much sway in the drafting of EU laws and measures concerning everything from blacklisting bad chemicals to deciding how to set carbon dioxide emission caps. The EU assembly and member-states adopt laws that directly affect the daily lives of 490 million people.

The outcome of those laws can have a major impact on companies doing business in the 27-nation bloc.

Register aims to end era of impunity

Many feel that the lobbyists have worked with impunity in the European capital, without having to provide any information on the dealings, financial status or partners in business and politics.

The new register aims to change this. Under the new rules, professional lobbyists would have to disclose in the register the importance of their major clients and the costs associated with lobbying, while NGOs and think-tanks would be required to state their overall budgets and main funding sources.

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Army imparts arms training to girls in Kashmir

Girl students in India's northern Jammu and Kashmir are being imparted with special arms training by the Indian Army to counter militancy in the state. The picturesque Bhaderwah valley in the remote hills of Doda district is these days reverberating with the sound of the gunshots being fired by the young girls who are being trained in the use of the AK 47.

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New trend in biofuels has new risks

In the past year, as the diversion of food crops like corn and palm to make biofuels has helped to drive up food prices, investors and politicians have begun promoting newer, so-called second-generation biofuels as the next wave of green energy. These, made from non-food crops like reeds and wild grasses, would offer fuel without the risk of taking food off the table, they said.

But now, biologists and botanists are warning that they, too, may bring serious unintended consequences. Most of these newer crops are what scientists label invasive species — that is, weeds — that have an extraordinarily high potential to escape biofuel plantations, overrun adjacent farms and natural land, and create economic and ecological havoc in the process, they now say.

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