Sec. 206. Refund of monies owed by the United Nations to the United States
396 words·~2 min read·
/bill/113/hr/3155/ih/section-206·A research copy — for the controlling text, always check the official state or federal source. Not legal advice.
Congress makes the following findings: United States taxpayer funds overpaid to United Nations Entities and payable back to the United States sometimes remain in the hands of the United Nations because the United States has not requested the return of those funds. Such funds have been paid into, among other United Nations Entities, the United Nations Tax Equalization Fund (TEF), which was established under the provisions of United Nations General Assembly Resolution 973 (1955), and which is used to reimburse United Nations staff members subject to United States income taxes for the cost of those taxes.
In recent years, the TEF has taken in considerably more money than it has paid out, with the United States apparently overpaying into the TEF by $52,200,000 in the 2008–2009 timeframe alone. According to the United Nations Financial Report and Audited Financial Statements released on July 29, 2010, . As of 31 December 2009, an amount of $179.0 million was payable to the United States of America pending instructions as to its disposition. That balance was allowed to accrue notwithstanding United Nations Financial Regulation 4.12, which states that any such surpluses . shall be credited against the assessed contributions due from that Member State the following year.
Allowing the United Nations to regularly overcharge the United States and to retain those overpayments, or to spend them on wholly unrelated activities, is a disservice to American taxpayers and a subversion of the Congressional budget process. It is the policy of the United States— to annually instruct the United Nations to return to the United States any surplus assessed contributions or other overpayments by the United States to any United Nations Entity; and to use the voice and vote of the United States to press the United Nations to reform its TEF assessment procedures to reduce the repeated discrepancies between TEF income and expenditures.
For each and every fiscal year subsequent to the effective date of this Act, until the Secretary of State submits to the appropriate congressional committees a certification that the United Nations has returned to the United States any surplus assessed contributions or other overpayments by the United States to any United Nations Entity, the Secretary of State shall withhold from the regular budget of the United Nations an amount equal to the amount of the funds that the United Nations has yet to return to the United States.