James Wasserstrom is a US diplomat who currently serves as an anti-corruption officer at the US embassy in

Kabul Kabul (; ps, , ; , ) is the capital and largest city of Afghanistan. Located in the eastern half of the country, it is also a municipality, forming part of the Kabul Province; it is administratively divided into 22 municipal districts. Acco ...

UN "whistleblower"

He was posted to the UN mission in Kosovo to fight corruption but in 2007 he witnessed misconduct involving UN officials and a local utility company. He later reportedly uncovered evidence that two senior UN officials had received bribes for awarding a contract for the building of a coal fired power plant and mine. After complaining to the UN's oversight office his job was effectively abolished and he was investigated for misconduct. Wasserstrom then went to the UN's Ethics Office where it was eventually ruled that he was maltreated but that this did not count as retaliation against a whistleblower. After a lengthy legal battle, documents backing his version of events were uncovered and the UN's Dispute Tribunal overturned the original decision. Whilst a judgement was not made on the alleged corruption in the UN's

Kosovo Kosovo ( sq, Kosova or ; sr-Cyrl, Косово ), officially the Republic of Kosovo ( sq, Republika e Kosovës, links=no; sr, Република Косово, Republika Kosovo, links=no), is a partially recognised state in Southeast Euro ...

mission, it was decided that the UN's original evidence was conflicted and that the mechanisms for dealing with whistleblowers within the UN were fundamentally flawed.

United Nations The United Nations (UN) is an intergovernmental organization whose stated purposes are to maintain international peace and international security, security, develop friendly relations among nations, achieve international cooperation, and be ...

Secretary General,

Ban Ki-moon Ban Ki-moon (; ; born 13 June 1944) is a South Korean politician and diplomat who served as the eighth secretary-general of the United Nations between 2007 and 2016. Prior to his appointment as secretary-general, Ban was his country's Minister ...

had refused to hand over confidential documents relating to the case to the UN personnel tribunal, despite repeated orders by the tribunal to do so. Wasserstrom has been critical of the pace of reform in the UN and also of Secretary General,

for allegedly undermining support for whistleblowers by trying to limit the jurisdiction of the UN dispute tribunal.''Aggrieved U.N. Whistle-Blower Seeks Withholding of American Funds''
April 9, 2013 New York Times

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Wasserstrom, James Year of birth missing (living people) Living people American diplomats American whistleblowers American officials of the United Nations