Objections don’t stop Wolfowitz investigation

The World Bank’s governing board pressed ahead Tuesday with its conflict-of-interest investigation against President Paul D. Wolfowitz, despite protests that he had not been given the required amount of time to review and respond to the charges.

Robert S. Bennett, Wolfowitz’s lawyer, said the board had delivered more than 600 pages of reports, transcripts and other documents Sunday night and demanded that Wolfowitz respond by today.

Bank rules, Bennett said, require that in such circumstances, staff members be given at least five business days to review the documents.

“This is terribly unfair,” Bennett said in a statement.

But according to a veteran World Bank staffer who requested anonymity because he is not authorized to discuss personnel matters, Wolfowitz, as the bank president, is not deemed by the board to be a staff member, so the five-day review requirement does not apply.

A network of international activists, Avaaz.org, announced Tuesday that it would try today to deliver to bank board members an online petition -- signed by 50,000 people from all 180 World Bank member countries -- demanding that Wolfowitz be fired.

“Governments around the world, the World Bank Staff Association, even Wolfowitz’s own deputies believe he should resign,” the group’s petition drive says. “The World Bank is far from perfect. Some of its policies have helped alleviate poverty; others have made things worse. But fixing it is urgently important for the world’s poor -- and no progress is possible so long as Wolfowitz is in charge.”

Avaaz.org was co-founded by Res Publica, a New York-based organization that promotes the involvement of public-sector professionals in governance and democracy issues, and the online activist group MoveOn.org.

Meanwhile, at the White House, spokesman Tony Snow reaffirmed President Bush’s confidence in Wolfowitz, who served as deputy Defense secretary before joining the bank.

But at a meeting in Brussels, European finance ministers gave Wolfowitz a uniform thumbs-down, the Associated Press reported. “What we need is a president with a good reputation and integrity,” said Dutch Finance Minister Wouter Bos.

“It is impossible to go around the world speaking about good governance without good governance at the World Bank,” added Belgian Finance Minister Didier Reynders.

Wolfowitz is being investigated to determine whether he violated bank rules by helping to arrange a promotion and pay raise for his companion, Shaha Ali Riza, who was already an official at the bank when he became president.

When he joined the bank, Wolfowitz raised the issue of a possible conflict of interest involving his supervision of Riza, then helped to arrange her involuntary transfer to the State Department. She remained on the bank’s payroll, though, and received a 36% pay raise, to $180,000 a year.

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Times staff writer Maura Reynolds contributed to this report.