President Donald Trump's plans to cut contributions to United Nations peacekeeping operations will make it “simply impossible” to continue such humanitarian works, a UN spokesman has said.
Heavy cuts to UN operations were signalled in the US administration's budget proposals released Tuesday.
The US is the biggest contributor to the UN funds, footing 22% of the $5.4 billion core budget. It currently pays 28.5% of the UN's $7.9 billion peacekeeping budget but Trump wants to bring it down to 25%.
Bangladesh has
6,815 peacekeepers serving in the UN peacekeeping missions around the world as of April this year. Bangladeshi peacekeepers have been highly lauded for their professionalism and performance.
The Trump proposal cuts about a third from US diplomacy and aid budgets, or nearly $19 billion,
Reuters reports. These cuts include slashing some $1 billion from a UN peacekeeping funding and a steep cut to funding for international organisations.
"The figures presented would simply make it impossible for the UN to continue all of its essential work advancing peace, development, human rights and humanitarian assistance," Stephane Dujarric, spokesman for Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, said in a statement.
Trump has said the US share of the UN budgets was "unfair." US ambassador to the UN Nikki Haley said in a statement on Tuesday that the US budget "reflected the reality that resources are not unlimited,"
Deutsche Welle reports.
Washington is reviewing each of the 16 UN peacekeeping missions as the annual mandates come up for renewal by the Security Council in a bid to cut costs.
The General Assembly is currently negotiating the peacekeeping budget from July 1, 2017 to June 30, 2018 and will later this year negotiate the next UN regular budget, according to Reuters.
The peacekeeping budget covers 16 missions, a regional center, logistics base and deployment of over 113,000 personnel.