Trump administration backs U.S. candidate to retain UN telecoms post

By Emma Farge

GENEVA (Reuters) -The U.S. government on Wednesday backed a Biden-era nominee to stay in charge of a U.N. telecoms agency, underlining U.S. interest in global technologies in a relatively rare show of support for a multilateral body under the Trump administration.

U.S. President Donald Trump has so far largely retreated from U.N. institutions: he has cut funding to aid agencies, plans to leave the World Health Organization and has not yet installed permanent U.N. ambassadors in New York or Geneva.

But Secretary of State Marco Rubio endorsed U.S. candidate Doreen Bogdan-Martin for re-election to the International Telecommunication Union - a 160-year-old Geneva-based agency that sets standards for new technologies.

"At a time when global networks and digital technologies are increasingly impacting the global economy, ITU needs the right leadership," Rubio said.

The qualified radio operator who grew up in New Jersey and spent most of her career at the ITU, was elected the first woman to lead it in 2022, when she beat the Russian candidate after a campaign publicly endorsed by former President Joe Biden.

As with many U.N. elections, nation state endorsement is a condition to run for the ITU election set to take place in 2026.

The ITU has so far been spared most of the foreign aid cuts.

Trump said in February that the United Nations had "great potential and ... we'll continue to go along with it, but they got to get their act together".

Trump has said he wants his former national security adviser Mike Waltz to be his next New York U.N. ambassador.

(Reporting by Emma Farge; Editing by Dave Graham)

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