UNITED NATIONS, Jan. 17 (UPI) -- U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon is calling on U.S. President George W. Bush to help lift the congressional spending cap on the U.N. peacekeeping budget.
Ban told reporters Wednesday on his return from Washington of his requests to the president and members of Congress, telling them if the limit remains then the work of individual peacekeeping operations may be hampered.
The U.S. Congress has imposed a cap so the United States pays no more than 25 per cent of expenses for peacekeeping operations.
According to a scale of assessments agreed upon by U.N. member states in 2000, Washington is required to pay about 27 per cent. The United States is the world organization's largest financial contributor.
Ban said the gap of 2 percentage points "will result in annually a $150 million or $200 million shortage of American contributions, which will, if accumulated, create very difficult constraints in smoothly carrying out peacekeeping operations."
The secretary-general said the president and congressional leaders assured him during their meetings over the past two days they would discuss the issue.
