New York: A former top United Nations official and a billionaire real estate developer from the Chinese territory of Macau were accused Tuesday of engaging in a broad corruption scheme, according to federal prosecutors in New York.
The former president of the UN General Assembly, John W. Ashe, a diplomat from Antigua, was one of six people identified in a criminal complaint outlining a bribery scheme that involved more than $1 million (Dh3.67 million) in payments from sources in China for assistance in real estate deals and other business interests.
The case is highly embarrassing to the UN, which has vowed to act with greater transparency and accountability after past scandals. Ashe is the most senior diplomat to be accused of such graft and it remains unclear if it will prompt the organization to review how it elects leaders of the General Assembly. It is different from the oil-for-food program scandal in Iraq a decade ago, when an independent commission found widespread abuse.
Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said through his spokesman that he was “shocked and deeply saddened” at the accusations of corruption.
“They go to the heart of the integrity of the legislative process of the United Nations,” the spokesman, StEphane Dujarric, said Tuesday.
The complaint alleges a broad pattern of corruption on the part of Ashe, 61, who was accused of using the bribes to support a lavish lifestyle: He spent $59,000 on hand-tailored suits in Hong Kong in 2013 and 2014, bought two Rolex watches in 2014 for $54,000, and later that year paid $40,000 to lease a new BMW X5.
He also bought a membership at a South Carolina country club for $69,000, and solicited money to construct a $30,000 basketball court at his home in Dobbs Ferry, New York, according to the complaint.
“If proven, today’s charges will confirm that the cancer of corruption that plagues too many local and state governments infects the United Nations as well,” Preet Bharara, the U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York, said at a news conference. He said that the investigation was still in its early stages, adding, “We’re looking at a lot of things, and I wouldn’t be surprised if you would see other people charged.”
The charges represent a widening of the investigation of Ng Lap Seng, a developer based in Macau who was arrested by customs officials in New York last month and charged with bringing $4.5 million into the United States under false pretenses.
Ashe, according to the complaint, took payments from Ng and used “his official position to obtain for Ng potentially lucrative investments in Antigua.” In one instance, $200,000 was wired into Ashe’s private bank account in exchange for a foreign trip in 2014 in his official capacity, to discuss a conference center that Ng wanted to develop for the United Nations. The campaign to construct a permanent center in Macau seems to have started as early as February 2012, when Ashe, in his capacity as the ambassador to the UN from Antigua and Barbuda, proposed a “permanent expo and meeting centre” to be created with help from Ng’s company, the Sun Kian Ip Group of China.
Ashe asked the secretary general to circulate such a proposal to the General Assembly. The proposal had the backing of several other countries - including Bangladesh and Kenya - and Ashe’s letter said that the “Sun Kian Ip Group of China has welcomed the initiative and will serve as the representative for the implementation of the Permanent Expo and Meeting Centre.”
Since then, neither the General Assembly nor the secretary-general’s office seem to have taken any action on the proposal.
Ashe was arrested Tuesday morning at his home in Dobbs Ferry; he was not charged in the bribery scheme but was charged with two counts of filing false federal tax returns. The five other defendants, including Francis Lorenzo, the deputy permanent representative to the UN for the Dominican Republic, were charged with bribery and conspiracy charges. “Ashe made it very clear in emails and documents that he could use his access to the prime minister and other government officials to set up meetings and promote contracts with businessmen who were willing to pay,” said Diego Rodriguez, the head of the New York office of the FBI.
Bharara did not address why Ashe, a lawful permanent U.S. resident, was charged only with tax violations and not bribery, like the other defendants. He did say that he did not expect claims of diplomatic immunity to succeed in the case.
“We don’t think any immunity issues would arise in such a way to prevent the current charges, and obviously we do all that in consultation with the State Department,” he said.
A federal magistrate judge, James C. Francis IV, set a $1 million bond for Ashe, and said he would be subject to home detention and electronic monitoring, and must surrender his travel documents. It was unclear how quickly Ashe could post bond.
