UN financing

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The USA carries the can for more than just being considered as the major bad guy in the world. It also picks up the tab for a major share in financing the United Nations.

Financing assessments for the regular budget for 1998-2000 period. Major contributors:

USA 25%
Japan 20.53%
Germany 9.86%
France 6.54%
Italy 5.44%
UK 5.09%
Canada 2.73%
Spain 2.59%

77.78%

Of course some have branded the US a deadbeat for occasionaly withholding a portion of its fees. All arrears have now been paid.

The rest of the world contributed the remaining 22.22% assuming they all paid of course.

Regards

Original post

Member for

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Posts: 3,131

RE: UN financing

[updated:LAST EDITED ON 21-06-02 AT 05:53 AM (GMT)]Where's New Zealand on the list haha Garry }>, another point to support that inferiority complex }>
How much is 100% anyways? I wonder how much it'll go to my retirement/social security/medicare/prescription drug coverage (need plenty of that later, due to occupation bound to get cancer before i die) if we only need to support a still second best 10%. Americans are idiots, these EU contries pride themselves of social programs like universal health coverage, less work hours, and more benefits...yet our money goes to often the ungratefuls who will take the money and turn it around and accuse the US for bunch of stuff. Like does any North Koreans know that the food they're eating is provided by the South, the Japanese, and the US. NO, their dictator turns it around, relabels it as the product of their great motherland, and then critise the countries who just fed them as trying to destory them.

And then there's countries like Argentina, blaming the US via IMF on setting bunch of conditions that limits their monetary sovereignty or else no loans. Have they no shame? Didn't almost the entire western world told them years ago about their imminent collapse for their stupid economic policy. They blame the US because the majority of the IMF fund is from the US, but you're borrowing money damned it. Do you go to the bank and bitch about them not letting you loan money for your bad credits and your refusal to admit that? Look at Korea, they followed the very critical demands of IMF and now they already repaid the entire loan, years before schedule.

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Posts: 1,558

RE: UN financing

All you are saying with those numbers is, well exectly nothing. If you want some meaning full discussion about the finance of the UN you have to look at those numbers in relation to a. the number of people or the GNP. Because you can not expect a country like Holland to pay equal to that of the US.

Futhermore America did pay its deth after 9/11 because they needed the UN again for their "war" on terror. But they didn't pay for all of it. They withheld a large amound because they were kicked out of the Human rights commision, and they were only prepared to pay that if their seat was restored. (blackmail springs into my mind). So I understand that you want to defend the US, which doesn't in my eyes quilify as a bed guy btw, but do that with the right figures because if you don't put that into context then the figures itself are meaningless. I can defend anything with figures but that doesn't mean I'm right.

cheers,

jw

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24 years 2 months

Posts: 1,558

RE: UN financing

Let's really compare the figures:

bron CIA world fact book

USA (25%):
population: 278.058.881 = pop / % = 8.99.10-8 per person
GNP: 9963 billion = gnp / % = 2.51.10-3% per billion GNP
Japan (20.53):
population: 126.771.662 = % / pop = 1.62.10-7 per person
GNP: 3150 billion = % / gnp = 6.52.10-3% per billion GNP
Germany (9.86%):
population: 83.029.536 = % / pop = 1.19.10-7 per person
GNP: 1936 billion = % / gnp = 5.09.10-3% per billion GNP
France (6.54%):
population: 59.551.227 = % / pop = 1.10.10-7 per person
GNP: 1448 billion = % / gnp = 4.52.10-3% per billion GNP
Italy (5.44%):
population: 57.679.825 = % / pop = 9.43.10-8 per person
GNP: 1273 billion = % / gnp = 4.27.10-3% per billion GNP
United Kingdom (5.09%):
population: 59.647.790 = % / pop = 1.68.10-8 per person
GNP: 1360 billion = % / gnp = 3.74.10-3% per billion GNP
Canada (2.73%):
population: 31.592.805 = % / pop = 3.16.10-7 per person
GNP: 774 billion = % / gnp = 3.53.10-3% per billion GNP
Spain (2.59%):
population: 40.037.995 = % / pop = 6.47.10-8 per person
GNP: 720 billion = % / gnp = 3.60.10-3% per billion GNP
The Netherlands (0.65%):
population: 15.981.472 = % / pop = 4.09.10-8 per person
GNP: 388 billion = % / gnp = 1.69.10-3% per billion GNP

....Then you can see that America is the biggest donar in absolute numbers but other countries give more to much more per person or relative to their GNP.

best regards,

jw

RE: UN financing

"Where's New Zealand on the list haha Garry , another point to support that inferiority complex."

Ahh so a countries worth is determined by the amount of money it pays to the UN...

Yes we'll be joining the evil empire any time now... damn us for not eraning as much money a year as America... of course the fact that we pay on time and without condition means nothing.

BTW Needing to defend every action of your own country whether it was right or wrong suggests I may not be the one with the problem :-)

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Posts: 3,671

RE: UN financing

[updated:LAST EDITED ON 21-06-02 AT 12:39 PM (GMT)]>And then there's countries like Argentina, blaming the US
>via IMF on setting bunch of conditions that limits their
>monetary sovereignty or else no loans. Have they no shame?
>Didn't almost the entire western world told them years ago
>about their imminent collapse for their stupid economic
>policy. They blame the US because the majority of the IMF
>fund is from the US, but you're borrowing money damned it.

Actually it is Spain who has to be blamed rather the US. The biggest banks in Argentina are Spanish, so they probably controll most of the countries' finances. These banks didn't want to give loans either, in fact, they even refused to give money to people when they needed it. One has got to stay fair, and this crisis is NOT the fault of the US, but of their own corrupt government and greedy European and American banks. As I said, we EURO's are not perfect (far away from it actually :D).

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Posts: 1,404

RE: UN financing

Well Dutchy I assumed we would all know that the fees are based on a formula which determines the ability to pay.

The US paid its arrears before the attack on NY. There are other members who for one reason or another make late payments. At one point apparently over 3 billion US was owed over 2 being non US.

Regards

Member for

24 years 2 months

Posts: 2,491

RE: UN financing

I think the time is right for a major overhaul of UN funding:-

1. The UN does not produce financial statements in accordance with either US or UK GAAP, or international accounting standards for that matter.

2. Therefore there is no way to tell exactly what the assets and liabilities are, and thus no way to tell wherever the performance of the UN is good or bad.

3. It is not exactly well audited.

4. It is opaque.

5. It is not accountable for the money it spends, except in a round-about way via contributing nations.

What I am basically saying is that it must be accountable (to everyone, not just Bush) for what it does and how it does it. Until this happens, there should be no more extra cash.

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RE: UN financing

As to Argentina, i'm refering to the bailout by IMF, not the cause of it (bad foreign banks, lavish internal lifestyle, no export, etc...)
As to donation, my point is why are some's criticism so single sided and don't give praise where it's due. The US again this year have donated hundreds of thousands of tons of food to N. Korea and at the same time criticize the North Korean dictatorship as evil because if you know anything about those refugees in China you will conclude that the dictatorship is truly evil. Yet, not many knows anything about the food aid. Infact Garry even criticize the US before of throwing away tons of food and making inuendos of US rather not providing those food to people dying of hunger around the world. That's obviously not true because we are feeding the majority of people around the world that need food aids. There are few other countries doing the same thing, but ironically those are the ones that bitches the least on others when it comes to aids. You know where New Zealand ends up on that list. No one seems to know what i'm talking about on those thousands of N.Korean refugee and seems to ignore that. You got what's worse than another African disaster here and why isn't anybody else doing anything, until it's too late and then the usual BS speeches of "never again the world will stand idly by".

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RE: UN financing

Dutchy

So what would your view on how much of the total UN budget should the US pay? How much would be enough?

Its interesting to note that all of the big contributors are capitalist democracies. No communist paradise past or present in the tops ranks.

Regards

Member for

24 years 2 months

Posts: 3,671

RE: UN financing

I know who's feeding the North Korean people, and indeed, it's thanks to South Korean, Japanese and American food programs these people still can survive. But that is our duty, as rich and industrialised nations you have no other choise than helping these people, and you can not ask all of them to be equally gratefull towards us. The case of Argentina is something totally different than North Korea were an evil despot rules the country.

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RE: Geforce decares NK evil!

Geforce

I am truly surprised that you are calling the leader of North Korea evil! Imagine that, calling a spade an spade! If you are not carefull you will be calling SH evil and you will find yourself in agreement with George Bush. :-) Well 2 out of 3 anyway.

Regards

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RE: Geforce decares NK evil!

[updated:LAST EDITED ON 22-06-02 AT 05:22 PM (GMT)]Well he's evil, and he's letting his people die on the streets. And I would prefer Bush to be my leader over him. But still, the axis of evil is something stupid, because these nations are so isolated, they can't form an axis like Germany and Italy did for example. And Iran didn't diserve to get in that last.

But according to Bush, pretzels are also evil because they want to destroy our great democracy by killing our beloved leader :D.

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RE: UN financing

hey Geforce, how many times i have to remind you? What was said was the three countries "constitutes an axis of evil", there was never any mentioning of signed treaty to do evil and there was never references to the common people as evil. But, it was a point to show that the leaders of those countries acted brutally and in an evil way. Even in Iran, this was being refered to the totalitarian rule of the religious leaders, not the publically elected officials like their president. Iraqi leaders SH is evil, no question. Korean leader(s) are evil in that the rulers aren't only just Kim, but a few other top generals that keeps the paranoid propaganda going. Notice all these at a huge expense of their people's lives. Sure, if you rank them, N.Korea is the worst and Iran is the least. The problem is when Bush called N.Korean leaders evil, the populace in the south instantly complained and started mass protests, because oh no "Koreans can't be evil, even for the leader of the North, simply because they are Koreans". That's another reason why the world tribunal won't work. Unlike the major western democracies, most countries won't even put out their worst because it's impossible for them to view one of their own as "evil". In such example, the world tribunal just turn political. Yet, these people will waste no time to condemn other nationalities as criminals even when they know very little of the circumstances, purely becasue of prejudices. Again, it's political.

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RE: UN financing

Major UN peacekeepers comes from this countries:(US could be included cause they never wanted to be under the UN mandate-typical i guess)

AUSTRALIA
NEW ZEALAND
MALAYSIA
BELGIUM
SPAIN
FRANCE
UNITED KINGDOM
PAKISTAN
NETHERLAND
JORDAN
CANADA
ITALY
GERMANY
SWEDEN

I believed most will agree with me-cause these countries have participated in more than 5 UN missions.Malaysia for instance has /have -troops in NAMIBIA,CONGO,SOMALIA,BOSNIA,CAMBODIA,EAST TIMOR,IRAN,IRAQ,KUWAIT,SIERRA LEONE to name a few.

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RE: UN financing

The USA, Russia (USSR), China and to some degree the other major military powers along with Japan and Germany, have (for political reasons you could say) not been the traditional leaders in suppling manpower for peace keeping missions in part because the smaller counties were veiwed as more distant from the issues and therefore more effective in that role. It was Canada which proposed the concept in the beginning. That dosn't mean that the larger powers didn't contribute in other ways of course.

I believe this situation suited the United Nations and the US. On more practical level for the US, it has been reluctant to put its combat forces under direct UN contol unless it has provided the command and control elements directly. Korea would be the best example perhaps.

Given the fact that the UN has proven to be totally incompetent and almost criminal in the way it has comanded some of its military adventures, its not dificult to understand way the US is sometimes reluctant to step forward. Can you imagine the reaction in the US if a US commander of a UN force was to telephone the UN headquarters in NY on a Friday night to make a request on a critical military issue requiring quick and resolute action and be told to that everyone had gone for the weekend and to call back Monday am? This kind of BS has happened on more than one occassion and the troops have be left to die will the UN functionaires screw their girlfriends.

Regards
Regard

Regards

Member for

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Posts: 3,671

RE: UN financing

>hey Geforce, how many times i have to remind you? What was
>said was the three countries "constitutes an axis of evil",
>there was never any mentioning of signed treaty to do evil
>and there was never references to the common people as evil.

Even if it's true what you say, Bush used to wrong words. The most powerful man of the world should know that these words "axis of evil" refer to WWII. For the allies and adversaries, it's difficult to search for the underlying in Bush's expressions. If he had chosen his words more carefully, I'm sure many European countries would agree that North Korea has a bad regime, SH is a mass-murderer and that Iran is still influenced by religious leaders.

Sometimes, I would just wish Bush was on the AFM. I really want to ask some questions to him.

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RE: UN financing

I'm amazed that you can use the word "constitutes" to get GWB off the hook!

What evidence does he have of these countries working together towards a common goal, even on an informal basis?

It was a misdirected comment and basically, it was crass and unworthy of a statesman.

You can't let the guy off by talking about his sentiments, and what he "meant" to say.

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Posts: 3,131

RE: UN financing

[updated:LAST EDITED ON 25-06-02 AT 06:31 AM (GMT)]I think that was 100% direct quote "constitutes an axis of evil", that wasn't my word. In fact i've never heard of anyone in the US take it that way. They may not like the way "evil" was used to describe these countries. Hey i thought you're British, you tell me what ..Intel and AMD "constitutes" the overwhelming majority of the PC market.. means. No where can i get a connotation that there's a deal out there between AMD and Intel to dominate the market. Maybe when you start to translate into other languages then you get this kind of connotation. What's the big deal here besides being a real sore in the ass on everything Bush says anyways. Calling them evil, that i understand the controversy. But to me, the leadership are evil. The problem is what is our idea of "evil". As to axis, so, you'll have problem whenever i use the word axis which makes it a no no. Hey, don't stop us for using a word that Europeans have issues/complex with.

RE: UN financing

"No one seems to know what i'm talking about on those thousands of N.Korean refugee and seems to ignore that. You got what's worse than another African disaster here and why isn't anybody else doing anything, until it's too late and then the usual BS speeches of "never again the world will stand idly by"."

Gee I don't know why they are being ignored... can't be because the US has then all fenced off and isolated from the rest of the world now can it.

"Intel and AMD "constitutes" the overwhelming majority of the PC market.. means."

The word constitutes is not the erronous word. Axis is a name that has come to mean an alliance but used for bad guys.
During WWII the Allies were the good guys. They worked together for a common goal. They even helped each other.
The equivelent word for the "bad guys" was axis. It also means an alliance Germany and Italy and Japan did indeed help support each other, though japan was rather isolated they did recieve german support.

To suggest that Intel and AMD constitutes an axis of processor market domination suggests a secret or overt alliance where the two cooperate to crush opposition.
The fact that there probbly is no such relationship between these two rivals means that the use of the word Axis is wrong... just as it is the wrong word to collectively group countries together based on the fact that Bush in particular and the US and the West don't like.

The correct use of the word would require the states named to have gotten together and covertly or overtly helped each other toward the goal they are accused of.
Sure the countries listed have a reason for hating the US, which has dabbled in their lives with no real care for the outcome... they were after all saving the world... little things like sovernty just got in the way. But unless Bush can produce evidence of them working together covertly or overtly then he is not using the word correctly.

"Maybe when you start to translate into other languages then you get this kind of connotation. "

Maybe that is his best chance cause it certainly doesn't work in English... :-)

Member for

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Posts: 3,131

RE: UN financing

please Garry, no where in my English education says that. I want facts and you use "suggests". The word is exactly "constitutes...axis of evil", meaning exactly in "in effect....doing evil together". Nowhere it means there's an agreement. An axis is a "pole", meaning a single strong attribute that groups them together, in this case "evil". Again, this is very rediculous and just blind subjective. That can mean a ton of things even if it wasn't meant that way. Hence it is just the usual vocabulary BS. As to the big bad US closed off on the N. Koreans, please don't say thing you have no clue on. You live in the wrong hemisphere first of all, and you have a biased tendency irregardless of topic. In this case, you clearly have no clue what you're talking about. Don't see it from the US point of view, see it from the South Korean point of view and you'll realize you're just being an ass because you only know US blah blah this and US blah blah that. I don't have a reputation of twisting words, you do. I'm just telling you exactly what it means. If you argue about using the label "evil", sure that's controversial.