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UN Agency Boss Resigns After NYT Raises Eyebrow at Her Office’s Bad Loans

The UN Office for Project Services gave at least $3 million to the 22-year-old daughter of a British businessman Grete Faremo met at a party.

United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres asked a top official to resign on Saturday, hours after questions were raised about the investment practices of the little-known branch of the organization she had run for nearly eight years. The resignation of Grete Faremo, a former Norwegian minister of justice and executive director for the UN Office for Project Services, was accepted the same day The New York Times published a story on the bizarre decisions that had led the agency to an apparent $22 million in impact-investing losses. Faremo, one of the UN’s highest-ranking officials, wrote in a letter to her staff that without “knowing the full story, it happened on my watch.” After Faremo met a British businessman at a party in 2015, the Times reported on Saturday, her agency began to sink tens of millions of dollars into renewable energy and sustainable housing projects connected to the man, with little to show for it. At least $3 million was also given to the businessman’s 22-year-old daughter, the Times said, to fund her ocean conservation efforts, including an ocean-themed game by the makers of Angry Birds.