"I made a mistake," World Bank's Wolfowitz says Thu Apr 12, 2007 3:37 PM ET By Lesley Wroughton WASHINGTON (Reuters) - World Bank President Paul Wolfowitz said on Thursday he made "a mistake for which I am sorry" over his handling of the promotion and pay increase of his girlfriend and staffer Shaha Riza. "I proposed to the board that they establish some mechanism to judge whether the agreement reached was a reasonable outcome," Wolfowitz said in a statement he read at a news conference, ahead of the upcoming meetings of finance ministers in Washington this weekend. "I will accept any remedies they propose," he added. A meeting of the board on Thursday adjourned without taking a decision on the matter, a board source, speaking on condition of anonymity, told Reuters. The source said the board would meet again at a later date, which leaves the matter hanging over weekend meetings where Wolfowitz will play an active role on issues of developing countries. At the news conference, Wolfowitz defended his actions to send Riza on an external assignment to the U.S. State Department soon after he joined the bank in 2005, saying he was in "uncharted waters" in his new job. "In hindsight, I wish I had trusted my original instincts and kept myself out of the negotiations. I made a mistake, for which I am sorry," he said. But the World Bank's employee representative group called for Wolfowitz to resign during a staff meeting at the bank. "The president must acknowledge that his conduct has compromised the integrity and effectiveness of the World Bank Group and has destroyed the staff's trust in his leadership," according to written remarks presented at the meeting by staff association chair Alison Cave and obtained by Reuters. "He must act honorably and resign," she said. Cave said it seemed impossible for the institution, whose mission is to fight global poverty, to move forward "with any sense of purpose under the present leadership." WOLFOWITZ AT STAFF MEETING Witnesses said Wolfowitz came to the meeting and tried to defend his actions. The controversy spilled into the open last week when the staff association questioned the promotion and pay increase of Riza, prompting an investigation by the board. The probe is focused on whether Wolfowitz gave preferential treatment to Riza, which would violate staff rules. Wolfowitz, who was nominated by President George W. Bush, joined the bank after serving as deputy defense secretary at the Pentagon, where he was one of the chief architects of the U.S. war strategy in Iraq. Lingering distrust among many staff members and resentment over his close ties to the Bush administration and his role in the Iraq war has overshadowed his first two years at the bank. "For those people who disagree with the things that they associate me with in my previous job -- I'm not in my previous job," Wolfowitz said. "I'm not working for the U.S. government." U.S. Treasury Under Secretary Tim Adams refrained from commenting on the matter during a news conference. Development group Oxfam said in a statement such controversies could be avoided if the choice of World Bank president was not a political appointment made by the United States. Wolfowitz said when he joined the bank he told the board about his relationship with Riza to address potential conflict of interest issues. He said he took the advice of the board's ethics committee to relocate Riza, a former senior communications officer in the Middle East Department. http://today.reuters.com/misc/Print...AT007302_RTRUKOC_0_US-WORLDBANK-WOLFOWITZ.xml
Once a neocon, always a neocon. I'm a little surprised that he said "I made a 'mistake'" (yeah, the 'mistake' of thinking he could get away with his bullshit at the WB the way he did in DC). The usual gutless righty dodge is "mistakes were made."
Big Deal...So the man, who was likely to be the central banker for the New World Order, is a little corrupt. At least he didn't say "nappy headed hoes". Some time ago politcal correctness became more important than integrity.
And isn't it just a little ironic that Wolfowitz started this current job with a promise to stamp out corruption and end graft at the WB.
Yes this is correct. He did also state he would stamp out cronyism ROFLMAO I don't think personal integrity is a strong point of a lot of neo-conservatives.