Ex- Diplomats urge Bolton be rejected

[mburbank]

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Challenging the White House, 59 former American diplomats are urging the Senate to reject John R. Bolton's nomination to be U.S. ambassador to the United Nations.

"He is the wrong man for this position," they said in a letter to Sen. Richard Lugar, chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, which must consider the nomination before it goes to the full Senate for confirmation. Lugar has scheduled hearings for April 7.

"We urge you to reject that nomination," the former diplomats said in a letter obtained by The Associated Press and dated Tuesday.

The ex-diplomats have served in both Democratic and Republican administrations, some for long terms, others briefly. They include:

# Arthur A. Hartman, ambassador to France and the Soviet Union under Presidents Jimmy Carter and Ronald Reagan and assistant secretary of state for European affairs under President Richard M. Nixon;

# James F. Leonard, deputy ambassador to the United Nations in the administrations of President Gerald Ford and Carter, Ford's successor;

# Princeton N. Lyman, ambassador to South Africa and Nigeria under Presidents Reagan, George H.W. Bush and Bill Clinton;

# Monteagle Stearns, ambassador to Greece and Ivory Coast in the Ford, Carter and Reagan administrations;

# Spurgeon M. Keeny Jr., deputy director of the Arms Control Agency in the Carter administration.

Their criticism primarily dealt with Bolton's positions as the State Department's senior arms control official, his current job. They said he had an "exceptional record" of opposing U.S. efforts to improve national security through arms control.

The former diplomats also chided Bolton for his "insistence that the U.N. is valuable only when it directly serves the United States."

That view, they said, would not help him negotiate with other diplomats at the United Nations.