Wolfowitz Defends Actions At World Bank

Fighting to hold on to his job, World Bank President Paul Wolfowitz issued a broad-based rebuttal Thursday that blamed unclear bank rules for creating questions about his handling of hefty pay raises for his girlfriend.

The rebuttal comes as a special bank panel is putting together a report on whether Wolfowitz acted properly in the arranging the 2005 promotion and compensation package for bank employee Shaha Riza. The panel's findings and recommendation will go to the bank's 24-member board, which ultimately will decide Wolfowitz' fate.

The bank's former top ethics official, Ad Melkert, told the panel earlier this week the bank's ethics committee wasn't consulted and didn't approve of Riza's compensation package. The bank's former general counsel, Roberto Danino, said he believed Wolfowitz acted "incorrectly."

"Rather than attempt to adjudicate between our conflicting interpretations of the events that occurred here, the board should recognize that this situation is the product of ambiguous bank rules and unclear governance mechanisms," Wolfowitz wrote Thursday to the special panel's chief, Herman Wijffels.

Wolfowitz has maintained that he acted in good faith, he didn't attempt to hide information about the package to bank officials and that the package's details were not dictated by him but rather "flowed from the back-and forth negotiating process" between the bank's human resources head and Riza, who had her own counsel.

"While I am prepared to acknowledge that we all acted in good faith at the time and there was perhaps some confusion and miscommunication among us, it is grossly unfair and wrong to suggest that I intended to mislead anyone, and I urge the committee to reject the allegation that I lack credibility," Wolfowitz said Thursday.