JAKARTA, Oct 6 (Reuters): Indonesia's pick to lead the World Health Organization, its health minister Budi Gunadi Sadikin, Reuters that the United States should rejoin the agency after its exit at the start of this year.

A banker with stints at IBM and major Indonesian bank Mandiri, Budi is one of six candidates seeking to replace Ethiopia's Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus as the WHO's director-general, along with other nominees from Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Spain, Botswana, and Belgium.

During Tedros' tenure, the agency lost its top donor after the United States officially withdrew in January, with President Donald Trump accusing ⁠it of mishandling the COVID pandemic, a claim the organisation denies.

"Many member states feel that the US should be back. The US should be back," Budi said in an interview, adding that it was "scientifically impossible" to go it alone in the event of a pandemic.

He said he knew US Secretary of Health Robert F. Kennedy Jr. personally. "We can talk easily and the connection is there," he added.

Other candidates are also seen as potential bridge-builders with the United States, including Hanan Balkhy, a Saudi physician who has dual US citizenship.

Photo from Reuters