The United Nations owes India a whopping $62 million for its contribution towards peacekeeping operations, including troops and equipment—a top official of the world body confirmed.
UN has to pay an amount of Rs 412.82 crores as per the present day exchange rate.
As of 31 March, 2016, the United Nations owes troop contributing countries a total of $827 million, including troop costs of $261 million and active-mission-equipment costs of $480 million. The reports were released on Thursday by the under secretary for management Yukio Takasu.
Out of the total, UN owes India the highest amount ($62 million), followed by Bangladesh ($59 million), Ethiopia ($47 million) and Pakistan ($4 million).
“Money owed to troop contributing nations is always a source of concern because it is very unfair for them that they provide all the valuable troops, personnel and equipment and they are not reimbursed timely because of financial problems,” said Takasu.
Currently India is the second largest troop contributor with 7,695 troops in fields serving various peacekeeping missions.
Image courtesy: www.indiandefencereview.com
In the larger context, India has provided the UN with the most number of troops—nearly 1,80,000 troops which have served over 44 of the 69 peacekeeping operations.
Owing to India’s dominant position, the security council regularly consults the country before drawing up peacekeeping mandates that the troops have to be briefed about. Drawing up mandates for the troops has become increasingly difficult as hostile conflict situations across the world’s hotspots have seen a sharp rise.
On the flip side, among the countries that have to pay the UN, the United states stands out—$1.3 billion for peacekeeping and $917 million towards regular budget.
Takasu said the world organization’s financial situation is “sound and positive”. However, there is “some worry” regarding the areas of regular budget and reserves. “The financial situation of the United Nations is generally sound,” he said.
