Paul Wolfowitz named to chair advisory panel

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Paul Wolfowitz, an architect of the Iraq war who was forced to resign from the World Bank because of an ethics scandal, will chair a U.S. advisory panel on arms control, the State Department said on Thursday.

The former deputy secretary of defense and advocate of the 2003 U.S.-led invasion of Iraq will head the State Department's International Security Advisory Board, which gives the department independent advice on arms control, disarmament, international security and other matters.

Wolfowitz was forced to resign as president of the World Bank last year after a bank panel found he broke several of its rules by involving himself in the promotion of his companion Shaha Riza, a Middle East expert at the bank.

The controversy sparked outrage among some of the bank's 10,000 employees and prompted senior staff to write to its board complaining the leadership crisis had undermined their work, especially in fighting corruption.

(Editing by Todd Eastham)