The Next Oil-For-Food in North Korea

I've been in a blogging funk this week but stories like this one might just snap me out of it. It looks like the United Nations Development Program has been shoveling bundles of hard cash into North Korea and not asking for receipts. To its credit, it looks like the UN is starting to clamp down on this, and unlike the Oil for Food program, there doesn't seem to be any evidence that UN personnel were complicit or bribed--just naively shoveling millions and millions into Kim's pockets.

The best part is when the UN went to call the DPRK dudes on the carpet and chew them out in New York. It paid for three Nork diplomats' international flight, first class, at nearly $12,000 each.

When U.S. officials objected, the UNDP, in a rare flash of insight, changed its policy.

"Starting immediately after the forthcoming Board meeting, UNDP will not reimburse government officials' travel or other costs for attending Board meetings," writes Mr. Melkert, the associate administrator, in a Jan. 12 letter to Mr. Wallace. It apparently occurred to Mr. Melkert and his boss, Mr. Dervis, that it might not be appropriate for the U.N. to pay for officials of a country that is abusing the U.N. to come to U.N. headquarters to lobby for re-funding its operations.

Kudos to Melanie Kirkpatrick and to the whole WSJ editorial page. Claudia Rosett's tireless pursuit of the Oil-for-Food scandal--in which there has been an important and very welcome development-- got its start when she worked for the WSJ, and it looks like they've done it again.