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By Matthew Russell Lee & sources, Exclusive

UN GATE, May 25 – UNESCO, like the whole UN system under Antonio Guterres was been falling apart in corruption and fraud.

  Inner City Press has been reporting on serious malfeasance by the French Audrey Azoulay administration at UNESCO in Paris, almost as bad as Antonio Guterres' corruption in and of the UN in New York. A fish rots from the head.

The UNESCO corruption series is now more than 130 stories long. After pointing out most of the misdeeds committed by DG Azoulay's administration, member states did indeed take some corrective action. However, UNESCO is on the hook.

Faced with underfunding, political constraints and structural fragmentation, the Agency is suffering from the same crises that went unaddressed for years under the Azoulay regime, including abuse of power, moral corruption and misuse of public funds. 

The United Nations is facing the most serious financial crisis in its 80-year history. The overall effectiveness and efficiency of the UN system is under unprecedented scrutiny from member states. The changes ahead are palpable. For example, Geneva, long perceived as the undisputed capital of multilateralism, is undergoing radical change. Faced with budget cuts imposed on the UN, Geneva sees its historic role threatened, while Kigali and Doha are advancing their pawns to take over some of its institutions. A silent but determined reorganization is underway everywhere, except at UNESCO.  In these times of political and financial turmoil, it's business as usual at UNESCO. DG Azoulay is on a mission to visit the cultural events in Venice, Italy, and the Cannes Film Festival in France. Partying with public money in luxurious hotels and attending private parties is the priority of UNESCO's DG, instead of tackling the urgent need to reform the Organization.  

 The Dior evening in Cannes must be extremely important for DG Azoulay, as her term of office is coming to an end and the private sector may be one of her options for future employment. That's why she went to this glamorous event instead of attending, say, the 50th anniversary of the UN Interagency Games in France, for which she didn't even bother to prepare a video message.  Still, she’s fully aware of the critical financial situation of UNESCO, since on May 20, just five days ago, her ADG for Management, Jennifer Linkins, sent an email to the senior staff of the Agency underlining “the high level of uncertainty surrounding the future financing of the organization” and admitting that “as time progresses in the current calendar year, our ability to manage this risk decreases.  Accordingly, while I had previously stated that we would review and update the approach by end-June, we will be taking further measures with immediate effect”. 

The internal memo also reveals that the Azoulay administration is preparing cuts to programs approved by member states, without consulting them or obtaining the approval of the Executive Board as the governing body responsible for monitoring the reforms. These are not temporary measures, and must therefore be submitted to the governing body for approval.  Again according to the ADG’s for management instructions, from May 2025 onwards, although recruitment processes may continue, the majority of decisions on new appointments have been suspended, with a view to achieving a proportional reduction in staff costs in all sectors. However, these measures do not apply to cronies, and recruitment continues at full speed for Azoulay's friends - some twenty people, almost all of French and Italian nationality. 

Azoulay's current cabinet Director, Frenchwoman Margaux Bergeon-Dars, will soon be exfiltrated to the Department of External Relations (at D-2) and her deputy, Frenchman Flavio Bonetti, will be appointed to head a UNESCO regional office. The newly-elected DG will, of course, be able to reverse all these last-minute decisions taken by the lame duck Azoulay.  Clearly, DG Audrey Azoulay is less keen to prepare the Paris-based organization for the financial tsunami ahead. Other agency heads have taken far more radical and responsible measures. As a result, the International Organization for Migration (IOM) has already made budget cuts affecting 6,000 staff, the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs has said it plans to cut its staff by a fifth, the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) and World Food Programme (WFP) are both reducing their costs by 30%, and the World Health Organization (WHO) is faced with a $600 million hole in its budget this year. Other UN agencies but UNESCO are expected to announce similar budget cuts in the coming weeks.  Given the loss of funding and credibility across the board, it is now imperative to overhaul UNESCO's budgets and programs. This is no easy task, given that any significant change will be contested by the EU member states that still support DG Azoulay. Even today, UNESCO knows how to create posts and offices that benefit France, Italy and other EU countries. 

There is therefore likely to be political resistance to the immediate restructuring of UNESCO from member states that favor some entities over others, and securing political agreement on any changes later this year will require significant negotiation on the part of the new DG to be elected this November by the General Conference. With little time left for her second term, DG Azoulay will continue to travel and enjoy the party at taxpayers' expense, rather than push through the urgent measures needed to adapt UNESCO to the new hard-hitting realities. 

However, given the severity of the financial crisis, it is difficult to argue that the time is not ripe for a significant and rapid reorientation of UNESCO to be approved - and possibly carried out - by the Executive Board. While any proposed organizational changes will most probably not eliminate the severe impact of the forthcoming budget cuts, the consequences could be limited by increasing effectiveness and efficiency within the Agency. But for this to happen, there needs to be a strong political will on the part of the majority of Executive Board members. The governing body should find a way to put an end to DG Azoulay's outlandish spending for purposes other than the interests of the Organization

This is where UNESCO stands today. We will have more on that. Watch this site.

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