Paltry U.N. Salary Keeps Annan from Paying Full Rent in New York

Yet another reason why the United Nations is meaningless became apparent today: long-time Secretary General Kofi Annan and now his brother have occupied rent-subsidized housing in New York City for the last 30 years.

Yes, the man who routinely complains that the United States does not fulfill its obligations to the poor has stolen aid allotted to the needy.

The highest leader of what democrats portray as a legitimate super-Congress does not pay taxes in the United States. Still, he feels comfortable to have directly received hundreds of thousands of dollars in rent discounts paid by working families.

A man who urges others to adopt more open-government policies again refuses to disclose his own affairs dealing with abuse of power and public resources.

More of the same.

The story broke in the New York Sun today, and more details are bound to come out, but so far it appears that Mr. Annan moved into the ninth-floor apartment on Roosevelt Island in 1978. At today’s prices, the apartment, with a view of Manhattan and minutes from Midtown, would bring $4500 each month, while tenants pay about $2000. The rest of the rent is paid by New York taxpayers (which doesn’t include ambassadors such as Mr. Annan or his brother). When Mr. Annan became Secretary General in 1997, he moved into the official residence of the Secretary General and transferred the apartment to his brother, another ambassador with means far beyond the typical New York family. If we assume that for 30 years the market value to rent proportion has stayed the same, $300,000 would be a conservative inflation-adjusted estimate for the benefits these hypocrites received.

A post on the American Thinker proposed a great explanation on why liberals would tend to think this a minor deal. The fundamental agenda of leftists is to allocate resources based on political connections versus private means (related articles here).

I’d like to make broad parallels between this case and the United Nations, but I’ll first let more facts come in on the case…which brings us to perhaps the most interesting part of the story:

By all accounts this should be news. If Mark Foley’s sexually explicit emails to a Congressional page were fit to be aired for a month, no decent news source would keep this reporting off the front page. The story broke in the New York Sun today. Will other national publications carry it tomorrow? The NY Times, the Washington Post, the LA Times, etc., have yet to publish any information online. Please comment below: if major newspapers don’t give prominent coverage to this scandal, how can it not be construed as media bias in favor of the U.N.?

Here is the web page for the housing complex on the address listed in the article.