UNITED NATIONS – The United Nations announced yesterday the launch of an internal investigation into allegations that one of its senior procurement officers, Alexander Yakovlev, violated the world body’s rules by overseeing contracts with a company that employed his son, IHC Services.

Separately, Mr. Yakovlev was one of the senior officials involved in the 1998 procurement of the Swiss company Cotecna for an inspection job in Iraq. Cotecna, at the same time, employed Secretary-General Annan’s son, Kojo. Although the new probe by the U.N. internal watchdog, the Office of Internal Oversight Services, is not directly connected to the oil-for-food scandal, it raises similar concerns at the world body.

OIOS was “looking into reports that one of Yakovlev’s children may have been employed by a company that did business with the United Nations,” a U.N. spokesman, Stephane Dujarric, said yesterday. “It would be a clear violation of rules for anyone to benefit financially from their work at the United Nations.”

The potential conflict of interest, first reported yesterday by George Russell and Claudia Rosett for Fox News, revolves around a Lichtenstein-listed company, IHC Services. The company serves as a broker for the United Nations in procurement of services of other companies that supply goods to the organization.

According to the Fox report, since 1997, IHC has done $12 million worth of business with the world body under its own name – and perhaps much more through other companies. One IHC contract, for the purchase of $1.2 million in portable generators for U.N. peacekeeping missions, was signed in 1999 at Turtle Bay by Mr. Yakovlev. A short time after that contract was signed, IHC hired Mr. Yakovlev’s 23-year-old son, Dmitry, first as an intern and then as a full-time employee.

In two reports issued by the U.N.-commissioned probe under Paul Volcker, the Russian-born U.N. veteran, Mr. Yakovelev, was not accused of any wrongdoing in oil-for-food. According to Mr. Volcker’s second interim report, Mr. Yakovlev was the “line” officer charged with hiring Cotecna. While negotiating the Cotecna deal, however, Mr. Yakovlev did not know that Kojo Annan, the secretary-general’s son, had worked for Cotecna, the March 29 report said. Mr. Volcker recently announced he would investigate newly discovered evidence that suggests Kofi Annan might have known of Cotecna’s efforts to obtain a U.N. contract.

On another front, the U.N. chief of staff, Mark Malloch Brown, yesterday introduced Mr. Dujarric as the new top spokesman for the organization. A 39-year-old French national, Mr. Dujarric has worked as an associate spokesman at the United Nations since 2000, after spending a decade at ABC News. On July 1, he officially replaces Fred Eckhard, who has served as chief spokesman since Mr. Annan began his stint as secretary-general eight years ago. Marie Okabe was appointed deputy spokeswoman.