THE United States has singled out Dr Boutros Boutros Ghali for harsh criticism over his handling of the UN report on Israel's attack on the UN base at Qana in Lebanon, and this is leading to speculation that Washington will not support him for a second term as UN Secretary General.
Dr Ghali sent the report on the Israeli shelling of the UN base to the Security Council, despite the objections of the United States, which criticised it as politically motivated.
The report stopped short of saying Israel had fired deliberately at the camp on April 18th, killing some 100 Lebanese refugees. It concluded it was unlikely that "gross technical and/or procedural errors" led to the shelling, as Israel contended, although this could not be completely ruled out.
In unusually harsh criticism of UN and its leadership, US officials privately complained that Dr Ghali went out of his way to put his personal stamp on the report by signing it himself when he could have let his military adviser, Maj Gen Frank van Kappen of the Netherlands, send it to the Security Council.
The US ambassador, Ms Madeline Albright, accused Dr Ghali of drawing unjustified conclusions about an incident "that could only divide and polarise the environment rather than to draw practical lessons to prevent its recurrence", according to a US State Department spokesman, Mr Nicholas Burns.
UN sources believe Washington sees a chance to undermine Dr Ghali, who is lobbying for a second term as UN Secretary General when it comes up later this year, but he has little prospect of succeeding without US approval.
One US official accused the Secretary General of courting the Arab vote in the UN.
Dr Ghali's term expires on December 31st, and the succession issue will come to a head in early autumn, when potential candidates are sounded out by members of the Security Council. UN sources last night gave Dr Ghali only a 50-50 chance of hanging on.
If the US decides to dump him, the focus will turn on four world figures most often mentioned as likely successors: Ms Sadako Ogata of Japan, currently the UN High Commissioner for Refugees Ms Gro Harlem Bruntland, who has served more than once as Norwegian Prime Minister; Mr Kofi Annan from Ghana, Undersecretary General for peacekeeping operations; and the President, Mrs Robinson.
She has said she is not interested in the post, although she is backed by two lobbies: Irish American politicians including Senator Edward Kennedy, and a group headed by the former UN undersecretary general, Sir Brian Urquhart, now one of the most respected academics in the UN system.
Dr Ghali has frequently clashed with Washington in the past and is disliked by many US conservatives.
Republican hostility to Dr Ghali is one of the factors holding up payment of the US's $1 billion debt to the UN.
Geraldine Kennedy, Political correspondent, writes:
The Government has welcomed the decision of the Secretary General to publish the report on the attack on the UN base at Qana.
The Department of Foreign Affairs, in a statement, said that the report provided a thorough, objective and professional assessment of the circumstances surrounding the attack.
Action needed to be taken to show that the international community expected all parties in conflict situations to respect fully the mandate of UN operations, the safety of UN personnel and the inviolability of UN installations, and to ensure that attacks of this nature could never happen again, the Department said.