Report on U.N. Program Assails Whistle-Blower

The U.N. panel, headed by former Hungarian prime minister Miklós Németh, rejected Benson's view, concluding that the UNDP made a reasonable effort to address Shkurtaj's concerns. It found that Shkurtaj's criticisms grew after being passed over for the job and that he then began manufacturing evidence that he was a whistle-blower. "Shkurtaj's claims of retaliation are without merit," the panel stated.

Shkurtaj declined to discuss the report's findings, saying he would pursue his case with the U.N. ethics office. But he suggested that the UNDP would never have admitted its failings in North Korea, ended his U.N. career or attacked his reputation if he had not blown the whistle. "If I would not have spoken out, would any of this have ever happened?" he asked in an interview.

Shkurtaj's supporters challenged the panel's credibility, which was selected by the UNDP's executive director, Kemal Dervis, and which included a member of a UNDP advisory board. "If you are the defendant you can't be the judge and jury," said Beatrice Edwards of the Government Accountability Project, which advises Shkurtaj.

The Németh panel contend that Shkurtaj fabricated at least two e-mails he had given the Americans showing he had repeatedly alerted senior UNDP officials about the presence of counterfeit U.S. dollars in a U.N. safe.

The U.N. obtained $3,500 in fake currency in 1996 from an Egyptian consultant who said a North Korean bank gave him the bills when he cashed his U.N. paycheck. Shkurtaj, the panel said, ignored an Aug. 10, 2006, e-mail request from UNDP headquarters in New York to look into the matter.

Shkurtaj purportedly replied by e-mail the next day, asking what "procedures to follow for the money in the safe." The panel said it had "serious reservations" about the authenticity of Shkurtaj's e-mail, which could not be recovered in UNDP's computer hard drives. The panel did recover another e-mail Shkurtaj wrote two days later saying he had not yet responded to the request.

UNDP officials have suggested that other U.S. allegations were based on forged documents. In June 2007, the United States provided UNDP officials with copies of spreadsheets outlining some of the more than $2.7 million alleged payments by UNDP to Zang Lok, a Macau-based trading company linked to a North Korean firm that finances ballistic missile sales. UNDP officials said they could not find a single match for the dates, costs or companies listed on the documents furnished by the United States. Their own records cited about $52,000 in payments to the firm.

The documents were either "doctored" by someone or misunderstood by the Americans, the UNDP told Congress in January. Németh confirmed UNDP's figures, saying "there is no indication that UNDP" knew anything about Zang Lok's relationship to North Korea.