From the Times:

WASHINGTON — The Bush administration has ordered that government
scientists must be approved by a senior political appointee before they
can participate in meetings convened by the World Health Organization,
the leading international health and science agency.

A top official from the Health and Human Services Department in April
asked the WHO to begin routing requests for participation in its
meetings to the department's secretary for review, rather than directly
invite individual scientists, as has long been the case.

Officials at the WHO, based in Geneva, Switzerland, have refused to
implement the request thusfar, saying it could compromise the
independence of international scientific deliberations. Denis G.
Aitken, WHO assistant director-general, said Friday that he had been
negotiating with Washington in an effort to reach a compromise.

The request is the latest instance in which the Bush administration has
been accused of allowing politics to intrude into once-sacrosanct areas
of scientific deliberation. It has been criticized for replacing highly
regarded scientists with industry and political allies on advisory
panels. A biologist who was at odds with the administration's position
on stem-cell research was dismissed from a presidential advisory
commission. This year, 60 prominent scientists accused the
administration of "misrepresenting and suppressing scientific knowledge
for political purposes."