Episode
This Week in Global Dev: #144: Inside the corruption scandal that tarnished the UN
- Podcast
- Devex Podcasts
- Published
- May 7, 2026
- Duration seconds
- 1922
- Processing state
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Summary
This week, we take you inside a Devex exclusive: the $60 million fiasco at the United Nations, a complex story with an equally complex set of characters, including Vitaly Vanshelboim, whose rise and fall left a black mark on a key U.N. agency. Once revered as a financial wizard, Vanshelboim was the man credited with pulling UNOPS back from the brink of bankruptcy. However, as our investigation reveals, behind the diplomatic prestige and profits lay a shadow world of secret side deals, luxury cars, and a $60 million trail of broken promises. Now, as the former U.N. assistant secretary-general faces a reckoning from a Spanish prison cell, we discuss the lingering question: For a system that prides itself on rigorous oversight, is this incident a one-off or emblematic of something deeper? To dig into this story and others, Senior Reporter Adva Saldinger sits down with Managing Editor Anna Gawel and Senior Global Reporter Colum Lynch for the latest episode of our weekly podcast series. Request an invitation to attend Devex Impact House @ WHA in Geneva: https://pages.devex.com/devex-at-wha-79.html