United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has said the UN will cut its budget by 15.1 percent and reduce staff by 18.8 percent in 2026 as unpaid dues from member states climb to $1.59 trillion.
The UN chief announced next year’s budget on Monday, which he set at $3.24bn – a reduction of $577m from 2025.
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As of September, the shortfall came from unpaid dues from the United States, China, Russia and Mexico, according to a separate UN statement.
Guterres said the budget for the UN agency for Palestinian refugees – the UNRWA – will remain intact due to the high level of demand in Palestine.
“I made the decision to exempt UNRWA from any reductions that would have dramatic consequences on the backbone of the entire humanitarian response in Gaza,” Guterres said. The budget for the “Development Account and advocacy for Africa’s development” will also remain at 2025 levels, he said.
The UN will make up the shortfall by cutting 2,681 positions across multiple UN agencies, which he said, “correspond to functions that, in our opinion, can be done better by others or can be reduced by efficiencies”.
Some 18 percent of UN posts are already vacant due to its ongoing liquidity crisis from unpaid member dues and other debts, the secretary-general said. They are not necessarily related to the positions that have been targeted for cuts, he added.
“Those vacancies do not correspond to a political decision oriented by a strategic priority, but simply by the fact that people left, and we have not the money to pay for the replacement because of the liquidity crisis,” he said.
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The budget for special political missions will also be cut to $543.6m in 2026, down $149.5m or 21.6 percent from a year earlier, he said.
The cuts will be made by closing some missions and cutting down the operations of other ongoing ones.
The UN has gradually reduced its presence in New York, the home of UN headquarters, also among the most expensive commercial real estate in the world.
Guterres said the UN plans to terminate two leases in New York by late 2027, saving $24.5m annually from 2029. The UN has already saved $126m since 2017 by shuttering other New York offices, he said.
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