U.S. Issues Ethics Rules for Federal Employees

The government issued final ethics rules Thursday establishing uniform standards of conduct that apply to employees of all federal agencies.

The new rules apply to about 2.1 million federal civilian employees in the executive branch, but not to Congress or the courts. Officers in the armed forces, but not enlisted personnel, are covered.

The rules spell out broad authority for agencies to forbid certain types of financial holdings by employees and to order employees to get rid of holdings that could conflict with their positions.

For example, the U.S. Office of Government Ethics said in a fact sheet, a purchasing agent for a federal agency could not buy computer software for the government from a company owned by his wife.