[JURIST] Republican Congressman Henry Hyde [official website], chair of the House International Relations Committee, introduced legislation in the US House of Representatives Tuesday calling for broad reforms to the UN. The UN Reform Act of 2005 [PDF text] alleges that the organization is rife with fraud and waste, citing the recent Oil-for-Food scandal [BBC timeline; JURIST news archive] as one example, and would permit the US to withold 50 percent of its UN dues based on what it perceives as poor performance in specific areas. Hyde denounced the current UN for its ""gratuitous anti-Americanism" and castigated the UN Commission on Human Rights [official website] for allowing Cuba and the Sudan to "act as arbiters of human rights" despite their own troubling records. The UN budget in 2005 was $1.828 billion, with the US contributing $438 million. Read the press release on the introduction of the bill. AFP has more.