Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: TUESDAY, June 27, 1995                   TAG: 9506270065
SECTION: NATL/INTL                    PAGE: A-3   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: SAN FRANCISCO                                LENGTH: Medium

CLINTON: KEEP U.N., BUT STREAMLINE IT

At the same time, Clinton denounced Republicans in Congress who have urged a U.S. pullback from the body and blocked funds for the recent expansion of its peacekeeping mission in Bosnia.

``Turning our backs on the U.N. is no solution. It would be shortsighted and self-destructive,'' he told an audience of U.N. delegates and other diplomats. ``We reject the siren song of the new isolationists.''

Speaking in the ornate War Memorial Opera House, where President Truman addressed original framers of the charter 50 years ago, Clinton conceded some complaints about the United Nations were valid.

With flags of organization's 185 nations arrayed on the stage behind him, Clinton said, ``Not all the critics of today's United Nations are isolationists. Many are supporters who gladly would pay for the U.N.'s essential work if they were convinced their money was being well-spent.''

He said the same budget-cutting and scaling down under way in the federal government must be carried out by the United Nations.

``Over the years it has grown too bloated,'' Clinton said. ``We must consider major structural changes. The United Nations simply does not need a separate agency with its own acronym, stationery and bureaucracy for every problem.''

He said his administration would lead the effort toward U.N. streamlining and that it should be accomplished in the upcoming session of the General Assembly beginning in October.

An administration official, briefing reporters on condition of anonymity, rattled off a list of U.N. agencies and programs that the administration believes have outlived their usefulness.

They included: the U.N. Conference on Trade and Development, the Vienna-based U.N. Industrial Development Organization, a U.N. council set up to assist states emerging from colonial status and another one set up to combat apartheid. South Africa's abandonment of its apartheid policies made that council unnecessary, the official said.

Other U.N. agencies, such as the World Health Organization, the U.N. Children's Fund and the International Atomic Energy Agency are performing useful functions and should be retained, the official said.

Clinton also suggested the United Nations must be more judicious in its deployment of peacekeepers. ``We must realize the limits to peacekeeping and not ask the Blue Helmets to undertake missions they cannot be expected to handle.''

Administration aides said Clinton was not specifically referring to Bosnia, since the U.N. force there had helped protect civilian lives.

Overall, Clinton told the international audience that for all the successes and possibilities of the United Nations, ``it does not work as well as it should. The United Nations must be reformed.''