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| Thursday, 9 December 2004 |
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UN chief rejects calls for resignation UNITED NATIONS, Wednesday (Xinhua,Reuters) UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan rejected on Tuesday calls by some US congressmen for his resignation over an alleged corruption scandal surrounding the UN-run Iraqi oil-for-food program. "I have quite a lot of work to do and I'm carrying on with my work," Annan told reporters at the UN headquarters in New York. " We have a major agenda next year, and the year ahead, trying to reform this organization." Asked whether he was saying definitely "no" to the calls for his resignation, Annan replied, "I think you heard my answer." Meanwhile Security Council members expressed confidence in U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan on Tuesday, dismissing calls by some U.S. legislators for him to resign over the scandal-plagued oil-for-food program for Iraq. Even U.S. Ambassador John Danforth said he had "great confidence" in Annan although he repeated the White House view that no one could make a definitive judgment until all the facts were in from investigations into allegations of corruption in the $64-billion program. During a working luncheon of the 15-nation council, Annan expressed his determination to "carry out the investigation and to make the facts known to everybody," said Algerian Ambassador Abdallah Baali, the council president for December. "There was certainly a unanimous view that this was the right thing to do," Baali said. "Nobody in the room called for Kofi Annan's resignation. On the contrary, we all expressed our confidence in the secretary-general," said German Ambassador Gunter Pleuger. |
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