A UN tribunal ordered the organization’s anti-poverty agency to compensate a former staffer who claimed his contract was not renewed after he made serious allegations regarding financial transactions in North Korea.
In its decision obtained on Wednesday by reporters, the Dispute Tribunal ruled that Artjon Shkurtaj’s due process rights were violated by a UN Development Program (UNDP) investigative panel that questioned his credibility and trustworthiness, but never gave him the opportunity to respond.
The tribunal said this damaged Shkurtaj’s career prospects and professional reputation and caused him emotional distress and he should be compensated with 14 months salary. It also ordered the UNDP to pay an additional US$5,000 for failing to promptly compensate Shkurtaj following the Ethics Office recommendation.
Shkurtaj called the decision “a major victory” after a three-year effort.
UN deputy spokesman Farhan Haq said “we’re studying the decision,” which can be appealed.
Shkurtaj, a native of Albania, said in 2007 that when he asked what to do with counterfeit US dollars he found in the office safe on his first day working for UNDP in Pyongyang in November 2004, he never got a response.
He said that when he complained that paying all North Korean salaries and program expenses in hard currency instead of local currency was against UN rules he was told “not to rock the boat.”
Shkurtaj said UNDP rules require that counterfeit money be reported to the embassy of the country involved, and since it was US dollars, he went to the US Mission to the UN when he returned to New York in May 2006, which UNDP’s administrator didn’t like.
His contract was not renewed in March 2007.
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