Kids, eh? You bring them into the world, fork out on a swanky school and then they go and ruin your reputation as head of the United Nations. You can't help but feel sorry for Kofi Annan.

Tuesday's second interim report cleared the UN secretary general of direct involvement in the Iraq oil-for-food scandal. UN investigators looking into the matter concluded Annan had not used any influence to help a Swiss firm that employed his son get any food-for-oil contracts. Annan's son Kojo has been at the center of the investigation for being on Cotecna's payroll as it participated in the Iraq oil-for-food program -- even as his dad led the UN.

The food-for-oil program has been under investigation since it emerged that billions of dollars were illegally embezzled by Saddam Hussein and used as paybacks to companies, journalists and UN officials. Originally established to allow Iraq to sell oil in return for food and humanitarian goods in 1996, it ended when the US-led forces invaded the country in 2003.

Though investigators cleared Kofi Annan of the accusations and vindicated his claim that his son had deceived him about his work for Cotecna, they deeply criticized him for his mismanagement of the scandal. Still, when asked if he would resign Monday, an unusually feisty Annan said: "Hell no!" Wednesday's papers examine the ramifications for both Kofi Annan and the UN in general.

The center-left Sueddeutsche Zeitung is doubtful that Kofi Annan was wholly unaware of what was going on. Although he has been acquitted of personal involvement, the paper says that his "son Kojo abused his father's authority in order to get a lucrative job with a company involved with the aid program," and goes on to say that the whole "affair reeks of nepotism. Annan hesitated much too long before attempting to clear up the scandal." Annan's authority has now been undermined, which in turn damages the United Nations as it goes through an extremely important period of political reform. "The (UN's) clumsy bureaucratic apparatus should be reformed and the Security Council expanded. Annan can only play an important role in this process if he tidies up his own backyard first," it concludes.

A Web-only editorial by the weekly Die Zeit sees the affair as just the beginning of a wider investigation into the oil-for-food program. "Who profited the most from it," the paper asks, "Saddam Hussein and his henchmen, the foreign companies -- or even UN-employees?" Then it asks: "Should Annan and his staff have done more to prevent the abuse? Or should we blame the member states of the UN Security Council, who protected their own companies and ensured that business could continue without intrusive surveillance?" These questions will only be answered once the final results of the independent investigation, led by Paul Volcker, are published in June. The commentator concludes by writing that the scandal has much wider implications than Kofi Annan's professional future. "In September, the UN General Assembly will make a decision on Annan's ambitious and brave set of reforms ... but a global organization without a leader doesn't stand much chance of pushing these reforms through."

The center-right Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung uses the scandal as an opportunity to put a word in for Germany's bid for permanent membership on the Security Council. It bemoans the fact that "even the Big Five, who hum along to the same 'one world' tune, allow themselves to be led by their own interests" and believes that the present set-up is an outmoded relic of the post-war situation. "Germany and Japan are increasingly politically ambitious and have become pillars of the global economy," it writes. "India combines demographic size with economic potential, along with the needs that come along with being a large nation." The Security Council is not seen as representative and must be reformed. How exactly, is far from clear. What is however important to note is that, although there are good reasons why Germany should have permanent membership, there are also responsibilities that come with it. "Most Germans demonstrate little, or even no, enthusiasm for taking on more weighty responsibilities, especially when it comes to increasing military force. It's time to look at the issue seriously." The paper concludes by saying that whatever direction the reforms take, "whether they come to fruition or not, is as much a question of faith as debate."

German commentators are also pre-occupied with the failure of the Iraqi assembly to agree on a speaker. In Tuesday's sitting, parliamentary representatives were too busy shouting at each other to even manage to reach a compromise. So now, because the Shiites, Kurds and Sunnis couldn't meet each other half-way, or even for that matter at all, the country remains without a president and without a government.

The left-leaning Die Tageszeitung starts out by saying that "nothing's going right now in Baghdad. Yesterday's stormy sitting of the new Iraqi parliament demonstrates to what extent the political situation is blocked". Without a speaker it is impossible to run the parliament, elect a president or prime minister or set up a government. Two months after so many Iraqis risked their lives to vote, there is still no functioning government. Although many say that it will take a while to establish traditions of coalition building after decades of Saddam's dictatorship, the commentator believes that the problems are more deep-rooted and stem from the fact that the Shiites have a two-third majority, with the Kurds, as next largest group, being the coalition partners. "The Iraqi Shiites want to savor the feeling of being, for the first time in their history, the most dominant party politically ... The Kurds on the other hand see an opportunity to exert their autonomy and push for a share of the country's oil revenues." The paper finishes by saying that the present conflict will seem like nothing come the summer, "when the country's various political, ethnic and religious groups will have to agree on a final constitution. ... the shouting in Baghdad will only increase further over the next few months."