After a series of puzzling financial decisions that put tens of millions of dollars at risk, the executive board of a little-heralded United Nations agency took the rare step on Friday of voting to swiftly enforce a series of reforms.
The actions by the board of the Office for Project Services, or UNOPS, followed a report by The New York Times that revealed a series of questionable investments at the agency, totaling about $61 million, of which more than one-third may have been lost.
Friday’s moves by the board of the agency, which supplies logistical services to other U.N. agencies, imposed strict limitations on all financial reserves at UNOPS and suspended work at its investment unit. Its auditing and ethics watchdog functions will also be overhauled and its current business model re-evaluated, among other actions.
