Clinton Picks U.N. Envoy to Become Energy Secretary

President Clinton has named Bill Richardson, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, to be Energy secretary and will name veteran diplomat Richard C. Holbrooke to the U.N. post, administration officials said Wednesday.

Both appointments have been rumored for weeks. The officials said Clinton will make the formal announcement today.

Richardson, a former Democratic congressman from New Mexico, will succeed Federico Pena, who has announced that he will leave the Cabinet next month to spend more time with his family. The selection of Richardson maintains the ethnic balance of the Cabinet, replacing one Latino with another.

Holbrooke, 57, was Clinton’s point man on the Balkans during the war in Bosnia and is given most of the credit for formulating the Dayton, Ohio, peace conference that ended the conflict in November 1995. Although he resigned his position as assistant secretary of State for Europe to work for a New York investment firm shortly after the accords were signed, Holbrooke has remained active as a diplomatic trouble-shooter, recently trying to negotiate an end to conflicts in Kosovo and Cyprus.

As a member of the House of Representatives, Richardson, 50, handled a variety of delicate diplomatic assignments, mostly in countries with which Washington has no formal relationship, such as Iraq, North Korea and Sudan. He was credited with negotiating the release of 11 hostages in Sudan.

Nevertheless, Secretary of State Madeleine Albright gave him very little maneuvering room at the United Nations, preferring to keep close control of the post she held before moving to the State Department at the start of Clinton’s second term.

Sources close to Richardson said the former lawmaker was frustrated in the U.N. post and was looking for another job, especially one that would put him in a better position to run for governor of New Mexico. His name also has circulated as a possible Democratic vice presidential nominee in 2000.

Although the U.N. ambassador works under the supervision of the secretary of State, the post carries membership in the Cabinet. Some U.N. ambassadors work in relative obscurity, but some, such as Albright and Thomas R. Pickering, now undersecretary of State for political affairs, have become diplomatic stars.

Holbrooke, a man of towering ego with an equally oversized intellect, is unlikely to be satisfied to work in Albright’s shadow.

Holbrooke has been in and out of government since the 1960s, when he began his career as a foreign service officer at the U.S. Embassy in Saigon. He was assistant secretary of State for the Far East in the Carter administration and served as ambassador to Germany and assistant secretary for Europe in Clinton’s first term.

Richardson, who resigned his House seat in February 1997 to accept the U.N. post, is popular on Capitol Hill and is expected to be confirmed easily. He won unanimous Senate approval for the U.N. appointment.

Although the combative--some say arrogant--Holbrooke has made some enemies in Congress, he also is expected to win relatively easy confirmation. His reputation, following the Bosnia negotiations, makes him a formidable candidate. He was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize for his work in Dayton, although he was not the winner.

Richardson was returning late Wednesday night from Rome, where he represented the United States at a conference considering establishment of an international criminal court.