Republicans in the US House of Representatives have introduced legislation threatening to cut off US funding to the United Nations unless certain reforms are undertaken.

The bill is expected to pass in the Republican-controlled House but is likely to face opposition in the Senate and a veto by President Barack Obama. The State Department has said the administration opposes such legislation which it considers would seriously weaken the UN.

On the grounds that the US contributes 22 percent (about $3 billion) of the annual UN budget, the bill’s sponsors are seeking to pressure the UN to reform both its dues collection process and to ensure that the programs it runs are in line with US interests.

In 2006, the US Ambassador to the UN under the Bush administration, John Bolton, said the US wanted to make contributions to the UN budget ‘voluntary’. His wish has been incorporated into the new bill.

One UN institution in the Republican line of fire is the Geneva-based Human Rights Council. The bill seeks to withhold funding for the Council until the State Department can certify that it doesn’t include member states subject to Security Council sanctions, either for human rights abuses or for being state sponsors of terrorism.

Another target for withholding funding is the  UN’s Durban process for fighting racism which opens its third conference in South Africa on September 1st.  US Republicans consider that the process has been ‘hijacked’ to advance anti-Israel, anti-Semitic and anti-freedom agendas.

In a separate but related event, US Representative for UN Management and Reform, Joseph Torsella, protested in a letter to the UN (August 29), against the 3 percent salary increase granted on August 1st to all UN staff working in New York City.

In his letter Torsella said that “Such a raise is inappropriate at this time of global fiscal austerity,” when governments everywhere are implementing drastic austerity measures such as ‘layoffs, service reductions, revenue increases and reductions in pay and benefits for civil servants.”