The AP reported that the fund's investigators had examined a tiny fraction of the grant money dispersed so far and found "pervasive fraud" with up to 67 percent losses due to faked invoices and other requests for payment for AIDS, TB and malaria work in the western Sahara nation of Mauritania, where the U.N. Development Fund manages the programs.
The fund also halted grants to neighboring Mali worth $22.6 million, after the fund's investigative unit found that $4 million was misappropriated. Half of Mali's TB and malaria grant money went to supposed "training events," and signatures were forged on receipts for per diem payments, lodging and travel expense claims.
The fund says Mali has arrested 15 people suspected of committing fraud, and its health minister resigned without explanation two days before the audit was made public.
The bad part is Mali is pretty hard hit by malaria and that money might have done some good. Instead some shady characters in their health department went on trips or stayed at fancy hotels or whatever. This fraud is in a fund that has only $21 billion in it. Imagine what sort of fraud would come out of a $300 billion UN Climate Change Fund. That kind of money would make every corrupt minister in Mali pull 24 hour days to figure out a way to skim that money.
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