Billions of NATO-dollars unaccounted for
Billions of dollars are unaccounted for in the books of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. Parliamentarians of 28 NATO countries have no idea how much taxpayers money flows through the military alliance and whether it is spent legitimately, says the Dutch National Court of Auditors. This is due to an administrative backlog of decades and abundantly marking expenditures as ‘undisclosed’.
‘NATO might be wasting a lot of money, or maybe they are short of cash. Frankly, we have no idea’, says Saskia Stuiveling, president of the Dutch National Court of Auditors. The findings of the official controlling body of the Dutch government are a result of extensive research on NATO expenditures over the past forty years. […]
NATO is financed roughly by three funds. The first fund is filled with 3.3 billion dollar contributed by all 28 member states. This ‘common fund’ is used to pay for NATO-headquarters in Brussels, the staff working there and other common expenditures. How the money in this common fund is spent exactly, is ‘undisclosed’.
The other two funds keeping NATO alive, are two big question marks. There is one fund for international missions (such as the NATO’s mission in Afghanistan) and one fund for special projects (such as the development of the NH-90 helicopter and the eurofighter). Which NATO member states contribute to these two funds and if yes, how much, is classified information.
Bericht auf volkskrant.nl (Link nicht mehr verfügbar…) – NATO Transparency and public Accountability
