Click for March 1, 2011 BloggingHeads.tv re Libya, Sri Lanka, UN Corruption by Inner City Press

May 20, 2013

UNITED NATIONS, May 17 -- After more peacekeepers were kidnapped in the Golan Heights but before the UN announced it Friday morning, UN official Herve Ladsous on Thursday had a "conversation" not only with hand-picked non-critical journalists, but also with Syrian Permanent Representative Bashar Ja'afari.

Inner City Press spoke with Ja'afari exclusively on Friday morning and got his read-out of his meeting with Ladsous.

  But before publishing this story, Inner City Press asked Ladsous's Department of Peacekeeping Operations twice for its side, and asked Secretary General Ban Ki-moon's deputy spokesman Eduardo Del Buey, who refused to answer. Video here.

  While Ladsous is almost pathologically adverse to answering Press questions -- video here -- the defensiveness of the UN Secretariat, according to Ja'afari, springs from the fact that in the kidnappings, "some people are involved in the Secretariat... it's a big scandal."

  Ja'afari told Inner City Press that when he met with Ladsous on May 16, Ladsous "tried not to give the impression he is aware of what I said, but he is."

  What Ja'afari said, in the General Assembly on May 15, was that e-mail shows that the UN was aware of the involvement of Doha, Qatar in the kidnappings, including a planning role of the Syrian opposition "ambassador" to whom Qatar has given Syria's embassy.

Ja'afari told Inner City Press that this went up to the "high level of DPKO." Inner City Press asked Ban's spokesman Del Buey about this at the May 16 noon briefing, but has yet to get an answer.

Inner City Press asked DPKO in writing one last time, after Del Buey refused on camera, here, to provide its own read out of Ladsous' meeting with Ja'afari. DPKO replied, "Regarding the read-out of USG Ladsous’ meeting with Syria’s Permanent Representative, DPKO does not provide read outs of the USGs meetings."

Ja'afari told Inner City Press that at his May 16 meeting with Ladsous, "I insisted on him to investigate, I told him, the ball is in your court, go and investigate, otherwise it will keep on going on."

  But if the past is any guide, Ladsous' DPKO does NOT investigate. It never investigated its own role in the killing in Cote d'Ivoire of internally displaced people perceived as Gbagbo supporters in the Nahibly camp.

 It has yet to investigate its role in the killings, including of a peacekeeper, in Abyei. DPKO was asking this again on Friday, and has yet to provide answers, insteading wishing a good weekend. Watch this site.

UNITED NATIONS, May 15 -- With UK prime minister David Cameron at the UN and promoted to "do a stakeout" -- that is, take question, presumably not pre-ordinated and pre-screened -- a flock of UN correspondents left the scheduled Syria vote in the UN General Assembly and went to Cameron's stakeout.

  But once there, there was a scam. Cameron came out, read a statement and then said, I understand there is a question from UN Reuters.

   Understand how? From whom?

   Inner City Press asked the UK Mission to the UN how this came about, and now understands it was not them but "Number 10's press people."

   So did Cameron also understand what the question was going to be?

   Once called on, Reuters' Louis Charbonneau of Reuters asked a softball question about Syria, but only after branding it, saying, "On behalf of the UN Correspondents Association" -- an organization which spent most of its meetings in 2012 trying to get smaller investigative Press thrown out of the UN.

In fact, Charbonneau himself first filed a stealth complaint with the UN against Inner City Press, then Reuters supported Voice of America's formal request to get Inner City Press' accreditation "reviewed," according to documents obtained from VOA under the Freedom of Information Act. Click here for that.

  Later when asked at an on the record meeting to explain his and UNCA's role, Charbonneau refused, and told Inner City Press "the fundamental problem is your web site." Click here for audio.

At a minimum, the new Free UN Coalition for Access would say that the organizers of a stakeout at the UN -- in this case, "Number 10's press people" -- should tell correspondents in advance that they have already chosen who can ask questions. Otherwise, the independent media is being used as extras, as in a film.

  But second, what did Number 10 consider before handing this question to Reuters' UN bureau chief? We'll have more on this.

Footnote: As Inner City Press told the UK Mission, it would have asked Cameron about going to Sri Lanka for the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting, given its "accountability" record and Cameron's statements on accountability in Syria.

  UNCA, it should be noted, has used anonymous social media accounts, active even on May 15 during all this, to falsely accuse Inner City Press of being funded by terrorists, triggering death threats. These are not only Ban's UN, but now Number 10's, partners?

May 13, 2013

Minova Report Omits Roles of UN & Ladsous, Cover Up & Privacy Violations

UNITED NATIONS, May 9 -- The UN's report into the 135 rapes in Minova is notable for what it doesn't say.

  It doesn't say that the chief of UN Peacekeeping Herve Ladsous refused to answer Press questions about the rapes for four months, going so far as to have the UN Television microphone seized to try to avoid Inner City Press questions about the rapes. Video here and here.

  It doesn't say that Secretary General Ban Ki-moon himself belatedly said, on December 5, 2012 when asked by the Press, that the UN was doing its "utmost" -- four month after that, there have been only two arrests for the 135 rapes.

It doesn't mention the double victimization controversy, in which medical records were demanded and obtained without the women patients' consent.

The omission of even this issue, of which not only Ladsous' Department of Peacekeeping Operations and MONUSCO, but also the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, are aware from the self-congratulatory review of the UN's actions calls the report into question. This UN will never improve, as evidenced by Ban Ki-moon's terse dismissal of claims DPKO brought cholera to Haiti, if it cannot admit and only covers up its negligence and malfeasance.

  The OHCHR, aware of the role of Ladsous in the Great Lakes Region during the Rwanda genocide, should have done a better job in this report.

  While the report does, as Ladsous refused to do for five months, name two of the battalions at issue, it doesn't mention that one was trained by the US, and the other has been linked with the Hutu genocidaires-linked FDLR militia.

  Of the UN's partners in the Congo, the FARDC, it says this: "The FARDC also has a poor human rights record and its soldiers have for years been responsible for many gross human rights violations. Poor discipline of soldiers and officers alike stems in part from the repeated integration of former rebels into the national army without formal training, or vetting mechanisms to ensure accountability. The FARDC lacks basic equipment and logistics, soldiers are poorly and irregularly paid, while allegations of corruption, particularly among senior officers, are rampant."

  But it does not mention that the new Intervention Brigade will operate in support of just this FARDC. What could go wrong? Watch this site.

Footnote: That much of the coverage of the UN's whitewash report also omits these issues has previously been alluded to, partially analyzed and even filmed, but expect more in this regard - because this is another reason this UN does not improve.

UNITED NATIONS, May 9 -- Four years ago in May 2009 the Sri Lankan Army was advancing north toward a "bloodbath on the beach" in which tens of thousands of civilians were killed.

  The UN has been criticized for its inaction (and some of its actions) in Sri Lanka, and is now again studying itself to come up with recommendations. A panel under Deputy Secretary General Jan Eliasson was announced, in response to an Inner City Press question, on December 5, 2012. What has it accomplished?

  On May 9, 2013 Inner City Press asked Eliasson where things stand. Video here, embedded and UN transcript below. d

  He answered that earlier in the day he had an hour and a half meeting about the Sri Lanka review, by video, with such "outside experts" as Staffan De Mistura, Jan Egeland and Michael von Schulenburg, who was thrown out of Sierra Leone.

  (The 2009 successor to Egeland and Eliasson as Emergency Relief Coordinator, John Holmes, has been interfacing with UN-linked NGOs, but apparently not on this report on Sri Lanka. When Inner City Press quoted him about deleting at least some e-mails from Tamils, his staff complained with UN Media Accreditation. And see second footnote below.)

  The goal, Eliasson said, is to come up with recommendations to not have this happen again (he cited Myanmar and Syria). He will get the report, from two of his staff members and Michael Keating, and assess it and give it to Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, all by mid-June.

Will the report be public? That is a question that will be asked. Watch this site.

Footnotes: 1) Following up, Inner City Press asked the Office of High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay if there has been any progress on her visiting Sri Lanka. The answer was, Discussions continuing with Sri Lanka on possible dates.."

  2) When the Sri Lankan government screened its war crimes defense film inside the UN and Inner City Press wrote about it and some background, a fight began that continues to this day. Most recently, a pro government Sri Lankan told Inner City Press they will "complain to UNCA." And what? (Though even the threat is quite telling.) Due to attempts at censorship, for example demands that articles be taken down, Inner City Press co-founded the Free UN Coalition for Access. So, send away. We may have more on this.

May 6, 2013

UNITED NATIONS, May 3 -- Not only did UN Peacekeeping chief Herve Ladsous for four months cover up the 126 rapes in Minova by the Congolese Army, his partners -- the UN also reportedly violated the victims' privacy.

  Click here for new video, Roots of #LADSOUS2013, with six refusals of Press questions, three of them on the Minova rapes.

  By contrast, Ladsous has repeatedly refused to name the two Army battalions which were involved in the rapes. The rapists are given privacy by the UN, but the victims reportedly are not.

  On April 30, Inner City Press asked Secretary General Ban Ki-moon's spokesperson Martin Nesirky about it:

Inner City Press: It has to do again with these rapes in Minova, but it is a different question; actually, quite different. It is reported in the French publication La Croix that in the course of investigating or looking into the rapes, that MONUSCO [United Nations Organization Stabilization Mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo] staff encouraged doctors to give files of patients without their consent and then brought them a judiciary letter, tbasically doctors are quoted saying that they gave records that they shouldn’t have given, that were covered by privacy. I wanted to know, although obviously investigation is important and the battalions still haven’t been named, what’s the UN’s response to that? You have two competing goods... but are they aware of this allegation that they violated patient privacy and what do they say about it? Do they intend to do it in the future? Have they learned anything from it?

Spokesperson Nesirky: Let’s check with MONUSCO.

  But three days later, there was no answer. In fact, on May 2 Ladsous' spokesman Kieran Dwyer gave a five minute justification for Ladsous refusing to answer any of Inner City Press' questions, due to what he called "slurs." Video here.

  Yes, Inner City Press has questioned and reported on Ladsous' speeches and memos during the 1994 Rwanda genocide, when Ladsous was Deputy Permanent Representative of France, refuting those who opposed France helping the genocidaires to escape into Eastern Congo. That's not a slur - that's a fact.

  On May 3, Inner City Press asked the question again at the noon briefing, along with asking if new envoy Mary Robinson was looking into any follow-through on the Minova rapes. Inner City Press put the question to the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights as well.

On Friday afternoon, the following came in:

Subject: Your question on the DRC
From: UN Spokesperson - Do Not Reply [at] un.org
Date: Fri, May 3, 2013 at 3:39 PM
To: Matthew.Lee [at] innercitypress.com

We have the following from MONUSCO:

"In carrying out their investigations on allegations of human rights violations, including sexual and gender-based violence, UN Human Rights Officers are guided by strict guidelines and basic principles that must be followed at all times. Such principles include 'do no harm', meaning that the safety and best interest of the victim always have to be prioritized, the right of victims to privacy and confidentiality and the informed consent of the victims prior to sharing information with a third party. Psychological and physical consequences of sexual and gender-based violence are also taken into account by UN investigators in the process of preparing and conducting human rights investigations, and thus such investigations are regularly coordinated with various partners with medical and psycho-social expertise.

The UN Mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, MONUSCO, is concerned about some inaccuracies contained in La Croix article, including mention to the fact that, under Congolese law, medical staff is allowed to refuse to disclose information to judicial authorities in the context of a criminal investigation. This is false."

   The two paragraphs -- privacy and compulsory provision of medical information -- are contradictory. Given Ladsous' months' long refusal to answer Press questions about the Minova rapes, it is difficult to know how to assess the Mission under his control's allegation of falsity. But we'll try. Watch this site.

UNITED NATIONS, May 4 -- What kind of "correspondents' association" devotes itself to trying to get an investigative news web site thrown out, then shifts to anonymous social media trolling falsely accusing the web site of terrorist funding?

  One at the United Nations -- that is, the UN Correspondents Association, with which Secretary General Ban Ki-moon continues to associate, even on "World Press Freedom Day" this week.  Video here, explained below.

  Documents obtained by Inner City Press under the Freedom of Information Act show that UNCA officials met with the UN in 2012, asking for the expulsion of Inner City Press. The request was made in writing by Voice of America, which said it had the support of Reuters and Agence France Presse.

  On February 22, 2013 at an on the record meeting involving the leadership of the UN Department of Public Information and UNCA President Pamela Falk, Inner City Press specifically raised, as it had a month before, the anonymous social media posts accusing funding by the Tamil Tigers of Sri Lanka, which posts have triggered death threats.

  Falk sputtered, or rather screamed, that she didn't know who was behind the posts. But the account making Tamil Tiger false allegations posted photos from the Security Council stakeout, and stopped abruptly for ten days while Reuters correspondent Michelle Nichols went home to Australia.

This account revived today, again falsely alleging Tiger and other funding, and then after coverage defending taciturn UN official Herve Ladsous (who has spoon-fed Nichols and Reuters' Louis Charbonneau, as well as Voice of America's Margaret Besheer and AFP's Tim Witcher) and defending @CBS, where Falk works.

Falk has done nothing to stop or look into the false allegations of terrorist funding by her UNCA "leadership;" in fact, she ghoulishly took photographs when DPI conducted a non-consensual raid of Inner City Press' office on March 18, 2013.

  Falk then issued a legal threat from her @CBSNews.com e-mail address, telling Inner City Press to "cease and desist" from even asking why she took photos of the raid.

  Today, Falk has taken to promoting the video of her WPFD speech, as if to bolster UNCA's and her press freedom credentials despite the organization's attempt to get media thrown out of the UN and Falk's ghoulish photographing of the UN's raid on the office of this media.

  Here now, not anonymous like the UNCA trolls but on record as Inner City Press and the Free UN Coalition for Access is video of the UN's May 2 "World Press Freedom Day" event. As captioned twice in the video, one minute in, to show the public versus real face of Falk, the audio switches from the blathering May 2 speech to the on the record statements Falk made in front of DPI on February 22, 2013. This is, we believe, the true face of UNCA. Video here.

Watch this site.

April 29, 2013

UNITED NATIONS, April 25 -- How unaccountable can the UN get? On Thursday after the adoption of the French drafted resolution on Mali by the Security Council, Inner City Press asked French ambassador Gerard Araud about the MNLA separatist group. UN Video here.

Araud said that there must be only one army in Mali, with territorial integrity. So who will bring it about?

Inner City Press asked Mali's foreign minister Coulibaly what he thought the role of the UN peacekeeping force should be, to disarm the MNLA? He replied, yes they must disarm, but he pointedly said, ask the UN. UN Video here.

  So Inner City Press asked UN Peacekeeping chief Herve Ladsous, “Who will disarm the MNLA.” UNTV edit here, and below.

He had just said, at the Security Council stakeout microphone, that he would take questions. But he said nothing. Inner City Press asked again: who will disarm the MNLA?

“I don't respond to you” Ladsous said, then pointing to get a question in French. Video here.

  Previously Ladsous has refused to answer Press questions about the 126 rapes in Minova by the Congolese Army, his partners.

  So, after the questions in French, Inner City Press asked Ladsous for an update on the rapes in Minova -- as it had asked on April 24 at the UN noon briefing by Secretary General Ban Ki-moon's spokesman Martin Nesirky, so far without answer.

  Ladsous did not answer about the Minova rapes. Perhaps he'll find a way, as before, to spoon-feed some inaccurate half-answer to friendly scribes at Agence France Presse and Reuters, through his “spokesman” who was on the scene Thursday, Keiran Dwyer.

  When Inner City Press asked about the Minova rapes, one of the biggest -- but by no means the only -- scandals during Ladsous' shameless tenure at DPKO, it was Dwyer who answered or refused the questions, saying that the Democratic Republic of the Congo was not the topic of the day, DPKO or at least Ladsous wanted to focus on Mali, on the Council's agenda that morning.

  Fine, then. Inner City Press asked about the day's two other Security Council topics. On Western Sahara, where Ladsous' mission which is supposed to run a referendum with independence as an option has Moroccan license plates on its vehicles, Inner City Press asked, “On MINURSO--”

  Ladsous did not answer. In fact, Ladsous began to prepare to flee the stakeout, grabbing his papers as he fielded a question about the French-dominated Mali operation.

  On Cote d'Ivoire, Inner City Press asked Ladsous, do you have any approval for the drone (unnamed aerial vehicle) you put in the ONUCI mission's “budget submission to ACABQ?”

  Ladsous didn't answer this one either. How much is Ladsous paid? Is he returning any of his tax free salary? Because it is part of his job to answer questions.

  We have previously reported being approached by a range of diplomats who call Ladsous' behavior on this and other things “shameful,” a new low for the UN system, unacceptable. But who will do anything?

Inner City Press also asked Araud of France -- which is responsible for foisting Ladsous on the UN -- about Western Sahara and the outcome France has in previous years advocated for: the non inclusion, of human rights monitoring in the UN mission's mandate.

  Araud seemed to deny advocating for this, even in previous years -- as to this year, he said it was between Morocco and the US. US Ambassador Susan Rice did not come to the stakeout.

Of those who did come to the stakeout Thursday, the Permanent Representative of France and the Foreign Minister of Mali answered Inner City Press' questions, saying “ask the UN.”

  But the UN's Ladsous, paid with public money, simply refused to answer. Increasingly, we think we know why -- the initial questions about his role and memos during the Rwanda genocide. Click here. Should this person be the head of UN Peacekeeping? Watch this site.

April 22, 2013

UNITED NATIONS, April 20 -- The African Union has chimed in on Western Sahara in a letter to Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, reiterating the need for a referendum with independence as an option. (Inner City Press has obtained the AU letter and is putting it online, here.)

  It is this referendum for which the UN mission MINURSO was established, but the UN has failed to hold it.

  This year, the issue is characterized as US versus France and Morocco. The dynamic is colonial, and as regards the France and the US, a matter of the post World War Two card game that divided up the world, a topic which Ban's Secretariat seems to want to keep secret, click here.

  As the African Union letter from chairperson Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma notes, Western Sahara was put on the UN's list of non self governing territories back in 1963. There is a reason for the annual ritual in the UN's Fourth Committee.

  This is one of the UN's biggest failures -- one of many, to be sure, but one of the biggest.

  Click here for the UN's new, but potentially troubling, position expressed this week to Inner City Press on Western Sahara's two (or three?) limb test.

  In recent years, the end of April show down has been between France opposing a human rights mandate for MINURO, and an African Union members -- Uganda for two years, then South Africa for two -- pushing for it.

  Last year Morocco itself as added to the mix, in the first of its two years on the Security Council. To be fair to Morocco, on other issues from peacekeeping to Gaza it has contributed to the Council's work in the past 16 months.

  This year it is not Togo but Rwanda which is expected to push the African Union position. But there is a problem: as president of the Security Council for April, Rwanda often has to act not in its national or even regional capacity, but as president.

  This coming week on Western Sahara and MINURSO there are consultations on April 22 with the adoption scheduled for April 25, a retreat with Ban Ki-moon (the recipient of the AU's letter) in between.

  Ban Ki-moon was slow in releasing the letter; this is a pattern, on which his Secretariat has now sought the support of its UN Censorship Alliance, here.

  African member states not on the Council have met with Eugene Richard Gasana, bringing the full range of the African (Union) perspective, as one of them exclusively told Inner City Press on Friday. Watch this site.

UNITED NATIONS, April 19 -- The UN was founded from the ashes of World War Two. Five victors were given permanent seats on its Security Council, each with veto power including over selection of the UN Secretary General.

  How then can the UN Secretariat threaten journalists who link decisions, including on which countries are given which top UN jobs, with World War Two?

  Is this not censorship, or attempted censorship?

  Twenty four hours ago the UN's media accreditation boss Stephane Dujarric told Inner City Press to contact him “urgently.”

  It turned out to be about a single tweet Inner City Press had sent on Thursday afternoon, noting that as the Police Adviser to Herve Ladsous, the fourth Frenchman in a row to head UN Peacekeeping, Secretary General Ban Ki-moon had chosen to replace a Swedish woman with a German man, Stefan Feller.

  Along with a Twitter hashtag it launched earlier this year after Ladsous repeatedly refused to answer Press questions about 126 rapes in the Congo, #LADSOUS2013, Inner City Press added: #WW2.

  Dujarric had already pressured Inner City Press about its coverage of Ban Ki-moon, during Inner City Press' re-accreditation in mid-2012, and more recently about the #LADSOUS2013 hashtag.

But given that the rapes in Minova that Ladsous refused to answer Inner City Press about ended up being profiled on BBC News and in the Guardian, it might be unseemly to try to discipline or threaten Inner City Press about #LADSOUS2013.

  So why not about #WW2?

When Inner City Press returned Dujarric's call, he began by saying, “I'm trying to understand why on Earth you make any reference to World War Two?”

  He then said the reference -- three characters and a hashtag -- was “idiotic at best and insulting to Feller before he's German and millions of people victimized in the war.” He demanded an explanation, twice saying, “I'm giving a chance.”

  Or what?

  While Inner City Press as a matter of principle -- and perhaps to save breath -- saw no reason to recount it again to Stephane Dujarric, France only has a permanent seat and veto on the Security Council because it is deemed to have been one of the five victors of World War Two.

  In 1996 France used its veto, while Kofi Annan was seeking to replace Boutros Boutros Ghali as Secretary General, to extract a commitment with regard to the top position in UN Peacekeeping.

  It put Bernard Miyet in the position, then was allowed to replace Miyet with another Frenchman, Jean-Marie Guehenno, in October 2000.

  Then, under Ban Ki-moon who was also subject to veto power(s) to become Secretary General, France has kept UN Peacekeeping twice more, with Alain Le Roy in 2008 and then in 2011 the worst of the four, who was rejected for the position by Kofi Annan in 2000: Herve Ladsous.

  So Inner City Press shouldn't put UN Peacekeeping, Ladsous and now his new Police Adviser in the same tweet with “WW2”? By whose orders? For what purpose?

  Or is it that putting as Ladsous' Police Adviser a man from Germany, as opposed to any other country, makes it actionable to mention World War Two?

  Inner City Press, surprised by Dujarric's demands and threat -- “I'm giving you a chance” -- quickly wrote an article, including Dujarric's written statement, here.

  It noted that Dujarric's DPI led a raid on Inner City Press' office on March 18, rifled through papers and took photographs; the photographs were leaked on March 21 just after Ban's spokesman was contacted by BuzzFeed about the raid.

  Dujarric refuses to answer simple question: with whom did DPI share the photos that it took during the raid?

  We could also note that Dujarric on April 15 was involved in cutting off a Rwanda genocide survivor's story so that Ban could leave to attend another event, in the UN Tent.

 Inner City Press wrote about it -- perhaps Dujarric didn't like that. But didn't that pass bounds of decency? Wasn't it insulting?

  The problem here is the UN allow its top media accreditation official to grill smaller media about articles and even tweets, while controlling their continues access to the UN. This is ham-handed censorship.

  And now the Free UN Coalition for Access will be opposing it, and continuing to press for rules that will better guarantee freedom of speech and of the press at the UN. Watch this site.

April 13, 2013

UNITED NATIONS, April 12 -- A day after Inner City Press asked, on the 126 rapes in Minova, what “assurances” UN Peacekeeping chief Herve Ladsous had gotten, the question was belatedly half-answered at Friday's noon briefing. “Several” alleged rapists have been arrested; some commanders of unnamed battalions have been suspended.

  Inner City Press immediately asked if "several" arrests meant just the three it asked about, and for the UN to now name the battalions.

  We say “belatedly” because after Inner City Press on April 11 asked the question, and before Secretary General Ban Ki-moon's deputy spokesman Eduardo Del Buey read out the UN's response 24 hours later, Ladsous' spokesman Kieran Dwyer gave the answer to Inner City Press' question to Louis Charbonneau of Reuters and Tim Witcher of AFP, Ladsous' first and main defender.

  In the past Ban's lead spokesman Martin Nesirky has tried to excuse this blatant favoring or use of media friendier to Ladsous as out of his control. He told Inner City Press that when HE get the answer, he gives it to Inner City Press.

  But on Friday Ban's deputy spokesman Del Buey said that HE had the answer to Inner City Press' question, but that Reuters and AFP telephoned for it and it was given.

  He then claimed paradoxically, but we include it here in fairness, that it is not a question of "favored" media. How then should it be phrased? How about, lapdogs?

   Why not at least make sure to give it to the media which actually asked the question? Del Buey had no answer, said he “noted the objection,” which is also on behalf of the new Free UN Coalition for Access.

  This type of practice by the UN should have been confronted by the old UN Correspondents Association, but never was. It is that UNCA is run by and for Big Media, mostly the wire services, who benefit as friendly stenographers of UN officials like Ladsous.

One Reuters reporter, Michelle “The Troll” Nichols, even claimed that to be spoon-fed answers to Inner City Press' public questions by Ladsous and his three spokespeople constitutes a “scoop” for Reuters.

  Nichols said this in a false complaint she filed against Inner City Press on March 8, mis-describing a verbal disagreement at the UN Security Council stakeout about exactly this practice, of DPKO handing Reuters and AFP answers to questions Inner City Press has asked Ladsous or at the noon briefing for weeks.

  Nichols' cynical attempt to turn a verbal disagreement -- which she initiated -- into a supposed security incident followed the strategy laid out by her bureau chief Lou Charbonneau, who told the Department of Public Information that unnamed diplomats -- can you say, French? -- asked him whether based on Inner City Press' published media critique he didn't feel insecure.

  Physically, he hastened to add.

  Inner City Press told him, there's nothing to fear in that regard. But media critique is legitimate and will continue. Meanwhile, the anonymous social media trolling of Reuters and UNCA continues.

  UNCA long ago lost its way. But a company like Reuters? Perhaps from naivete, it's surprising. Watch this site.

UNITED NATIONS, April 9 -- After the UN raided Inner City Press' office on March 18, photographs of the Press' desk and bookshelf appeared on BuzzFeed.com on March 22.

  Stephane Dujarric of the UN's Department of Public Information acknowledged that Inner City Press “should have been called before entering” and photographing its office.

  But Dujarric said, “I personally looked at our pictures and those posted on BuzzFeed and it's clear that they are not the same photographs.”

  But the photographs were provided to BuzzFeed, through an anonymous “Concerned UN Reporter” e-mail address, right after BuzzFeed called UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon's spokesman Martin Nesirky for comment on the raid.

  Now Inner City Press has learned that multiple officials of the Department of Public Information (DPI) including Dujarric and some outside DPI received e-mailed photographs of Inner City Press' desk and bookshelf on the evening of March 18, while preparing how to respond to media questions about the raid.

  DPI's chief of the Media Accreditation and Liaison Unit wrote that she went back to Inner City Press' office and "took pictures.”

It was three of these photographs which appeared on BuzzFeed.

  What does it say about Secretary General Ban Ki-moon's UN that it raids the offices of investigative media which watchdog it, taking and then spreading and leaking photographs to try to undermine its critics?

  Ban Ki-moon today is meeting with Pope Francis; on April 11 after stopping in New York he will meet US President Barack Obama at the White House.

  Are Ban's UN's actions consistent with the First Amendment (and Fourth Amendment) to the US Constitution? No.

  Notably, when the New York Civil Liberties Union asked the UN in July 2012 about its rules, if any, for accrediting and dis-accrediting journalists, it was Dujarric who sent a response with no rules, particularly for dis-accreditation.

  In December 2012, Dujarric who is in charge of UN Television did nothing when UN Peacekeeping chief Herve Ladsous directed his spokesman to seize the UNTV microphone to try to avoid an Inner City Press questions about 126 rapes in Minova by the Congolese Army, his partners. Video here.

  Now Tim Witcher of Agence France Presse has complained to UN Security about Inner City Press questions to Ladsous, who is the fourth Frenchman in a row to head UN Peacekeeping.

   This year, Dujarric has sent Inner City Press a formal letter about its verbatim and on the record quotes from the two top officials of the UN Correspondents Association, Reuters' Louis Charbonneau -- who has asked UN Security to act against the content on Inner City Press' web site -- and Pamela Falk of CBS News, who has twice this year issued legal threats about speech (on the record audio here) and writing, from her CBSNews.com e-mail address.

  Ban Ki-moon's spokesperson's office, which often does not answer and lets Ladsous openly refuse questions, should explain who it contacted after BuzzFeed asked it to comment on the raid.

  The UN corrupts and undermines freedom of the press. This raid under color of law and leaking by anonymous authorities will be pursued. Watch this site.

April, 3, 2013

UNITED NATIONS, April 3 -- After Inner City Press asked US Ambassador Susan Rice about the UN's plans for Mali midday on Wednesday, and she replied that robust counter-terrorism should be separate from a UN mission with a strong Special Representative of the Secretary General, multiple sources exclusively told Inner City Press the person slated for that post.

  It is Staffan de Mistura, currently in the Italian government as deputy foreign minister but “not for long,” as one source put it.

  Previously De Mistura was the Special Representative of the Secretary General in Iraq, where as Inner City Press noted he hired Secretary General Ban Ki-moon's son in law Siddarth Chatterjee.

  Later when De Mistura was given the top Afghanistan envoy job by the UN, he told Inner City Press he would push with the Karzai government for answers on their killing of UN staff member Louis Maxwell. There have still been no answers, including to possible Ban successor Jan Kubis.

  But “like a bad penny” as one put it, now De Mistura is slated to return.

“What is this Italian connection?” one African delegate asking Inner City Press, pointing out that Ban's Sahel envoy is Romano Prodi, and that Ban recent gave the Deputy slot at the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights to an Italian,
Flavia Pansieri.

  Another asked, “Why are there so few Africans heading up the UN missions in Africa?”

  The three Western African missions are all led by Europeans. Bert Koenders of the Netherlands, head of the Cote d'Ivoire mission, was at the UN Wednesday, greeted Inner City Press on his way it's said to the Advisory Committee on Administrative and Budgetary Questions.

  There is also the American Roger Meece heading the mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. An African Deputy Permanent Representative opposed to this new nomination asked, “And now De Mistura? No.”

  An ambassador who Inner City Press asked to comment on De Mistura after learning of the plan laughed and said, “They're going to raid your office again.”

  Others from the Arabic and Muslim side recalled that to the recent Arab League Summit, “not only didn't Ban Ki-moon go, he sent to representative Jeff Feltman, before the US face in the region. What is going on here?”

  But to some the most dissonant note was De Mistura's job, prospectively this one, after hiring Ban Ki-moon's son in law Siddarth Chatterjee.

  After Inner City Press' cusp of the year exclusive on Philippe Douste Blazy's hiring of Ban's daughter Hyun Hee Ban, there were some calls to make this type of hiring illegal.

  But as Staffan De Mistura might say, if it's legal and it works, why not do it? Watch this site.

April 1, 2013

UNITED NATIONS, March 29 -- When UN Peacekeeping chief Herve Ladsous on March 28 simply refused on camera to answer a Press question about his inaction for four months on 126 rapes in Minova by his partners in the Congolese Army, you'd think something would have been done.

   Video here, at Minute 4:29 and 5:53.

   After all, Secretary General Ban Ki-moon has claimed a “zero tolerance” policy about rape, and more specifically a “Human Rights Due Diligence Policy” supposedly stopping UN support to army units which rape.

   But while Ladsous technically works for Ban, he was in fact give the UN peacekeeping job by the French government, which has appointed the last four occupants of the post.

   Ladsous was rejected for the job by Kofi Annan, and was not then-President Nicholas Sarkozy's first choice in 2011. But the UN thought Jerome Bonnafont was too brash -- for bragging that he had the job while in India, his posting at the time, as reported by Inner City Press.

   So France said, take Ladsous. Without any interview. Just take him. And Ban did.

   Inner City Press reported that, including that the French Mission to the UN told French media the morning of the announcement that it would be Bonnafont.

   Agence France Presse Tim Witcher then asked the UN Correspondents Association to censure Inner City Press for its report. Inner City Press fought back -- AFP was in no way the source, Inner City Press doesn't read their reports and hadn't even noticed Witcher to that point.

  Other big media in UNCA, Reuters' Louis Charbonneau and reporters from Bloomberg, Al Arabiya and BBC, among others, sided with AFP for their own reasons, and the fight was on.

  Ladsous, still mad about the Press reports, latched on to the UNCA fight and at a press conference on May 29, 2012 openly refused to answer Inner City Press' questions.

  Click here for (newly edited) video.

  The UNCA “leaders” did nothing about this open refusal to answer questions by a UN Under Secretary General. In fact, one of them blamed it all on Inner City Press. Not enough of a lapdog?

  Flash forward to March 28, 2013, when the story Inner City Press has pursued since November 2012, the rapes in Minova, has been half leaked to, who else, Agence France Presse. Inner City Press asks Ladsous, at the Security Council stakeout, to be more specific and name the rapist units “and if not, why not.” Video here at Minute 4:29.

  Ladsous pretends he hasn't heard, asks for other questions. From who else? Tim Witcher of AFP. And then another French reporter.

  Inner City Press asks again, about the four months and Ban's supposed Human Rights Due Diligence Policy. Ladous walks away from the microphone. Video here from minute 5:53.

 In most governments, at least in democratic countries, such an official would be fired. And at the UN? Watch this site.

UNITED NATIONS, March 27 -- Social media and the UN was the topic on Wednesday, when a representative of Mashable and an Internet activist from Egypt took Press questions along with ECOSOC President Nestor Osorio and the UN's Youth Envoy, Ahmad Alhendawi.

Inner City Press asked the two mostly non-UN guests to assess the UN's social media, including Herve Ladsous' UN Peacekeeping which does not answer tweets on Haiti cholera or rapes in the Congo, and the @SecGen Twitter account that Alhendawi that day cited. Video here from Minute 27.

  Mashable's Stacy Martinet acknowledged that the UN could do better. She advised letting other, “lower” levels of the UN do the tweeting.

  Wael Ghonim said that in Egypt, after the revolution, the military (SCAF) started a Facebook page and put its releases there first, bypassing the old media.

  Ahmad Alhendawi, who'd tweeted about @SecGen, said things should be a two-way street.

  Secretary General Ban Ki-moon's spokesman Martin Nesirky replied that @SecGen “is not official, run by well meaning individual, I believe based in UK.” Nesirky said that his office, “without blowing our own trumpet,” has 36,000 followers.

  It is understood that the UN did not ask to shut down the unofficial @SecGen. But would they try to close, say, @RogueBanKiMoon, for example?

  These days in the UN press corps, the old media “leaders” of the UN Correspondents Association have started no fewer than six anonymous social media accounts to try to undermine the new Free UN Coalition for Access, which thanked the panelists on Wednesday, and Inner City Press which co-founded FUNCA.

  In their anonymous accounts, targeted at countries' mission to the UN, the UNCA “leaders” have falsely alleged Inner City Press receives terrorist funding, or -- somehow worse? -- funding from Rwanda.

But who are these leaders of UNCA, now known alternatively as the UN's Censorship Alliance or, due to anonymity, the UN Cowardice Alliance?

  There is UNCA President Pamela Falk, who send out corporate tweets from CBS, does not respond to questions or critiques, and deleted without explanation tweets that were inaccurate and came into question.

  Falk has not tweeted since March 24, the day after she sent a legal threat to Inner City Press not to even ask why she was taking photographs of the UN's March 18 raid on the Press office.

  There's UNCA Second Vice President Masood Haider of the Dawn of Pakistan, with 87 followers and seven tweets in the 27 days of March including one that simple reads, @nypost.

  There's UNCA Third Vice President Sylviane Zehil of L'Orient Le Jour with 92 followers and tweets, a recent sample of which is “Citigroup to Improve Anti-Money Laundering Controls,” without any link much less critique or analysis.

  There's UNCA First Vice President and Concerned UN Reporter candidate Louis Charbonneau, most of whose tweets are just corporate pass-throughs from Reuters, as if on auto-pilot. He also religiously re-tweets his Reuters underling Michelle Nichols, who filed a false complaint echoing his, along with AFP.

  There's UNCA Executive Committee member at large Tim Witcher of Agence France Presse, with 127 followers and seven tweets in March, the first of which was a re-tweet of the co-stolen Minova rape story of Reuters' Michelle Nichols, with whom Witcher went on to file a false complaint for being called, accurately, a lapdog.

  We could go on, as they do. Watch this site.

March 25, 2013

UNITED NATIONS, March 20 -- On the second day of the Arms Trade Treaty talks at the UN in New York, Inner City Press asked Amnesty International's Salil Shetty what Amnesty thinks of calls by France, the UK and others to arm the rebels in Syria. Video here.

  Shetty replied, “We have been critical of the Assad regime,” saying its “atrocities far exceed the rebels'... [but] increasingly our reports take about abuse by rebels.”

  He cited the “Golden Rule... Assessment has to be made of risks involved, no exception in the case of the rebel groups.”

  Amnesty's Head of Arms Control and Human Rights Brian Wood then stated Amnesty's position that “at present, no arms should go to Syria” because “for sure there's a substantial risk that arms to those [opposition] brigades are going to be used for war crimes.”

   He said “there's a slight difference” in that with the rebels, “if measures are taken and risk is removed, then the situation would change.”

   This appears to be the claim of President Francois Hollande of France, of the prospective assurances he says he's gotten from the rebels.

  Wood zeroed in on Article 3.3 of the draft ATT, which adds after “the US put working in” to the concept that it is unlawful to assist in war crimes the need to prove intent. The American phrase is, “for the purpose of” assisting war crimes. Expect more on this.

  Inner City Press asked these questions, and others on Cote d'Ivoire, at an Amnesty International press conference that while held in the UN's Dag Hammarskjold Library Auditorium was not on UN Television, unlike a similar press conference by Oxfam on the first day of the ATT talks.

  Oxfam's press conference listed and was apparently sponsored by Mexico's mission. Amnesty's mistake was to rely on the increasingly discredited UN Correspondents Association, now known at the UN's Censorship Alliance.

  After devoting most of its meetings in 2012 to trying to get the investigative Press thrown out of the UN -- this is evidenced by documents obtained under the US Freedom of Information Act from Voice of America, also concerning the Reuters and AFP bureaux at the UN -- in 2013 UNCA “leaders” have torn down flyers of the new Free UN Coalition for Access -- then posted their “branding” of the AI presser on the resulting non-UNCA bulletin board won after advocacy by FUNCA.

  The day before Shetty's press conference, UNCA president Pamela Falk ghoulishly took photographs of the UN's non-consensual search of Inner City Press' office two stories above the auditorium. Golden Rule, indeed... Watch this site.

After Photographing UN Raid of ICP Office, Falk of CBS & UNCA Sends ICP a Legal Threat About Story

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNdisclosed Location, March 23 -- After Pamela Falk of CBS took photographs during the non-consensual search of Inner City Press office by the UN on March 18, and photographs were published by BuzzFeed on March 22, Inner City Press posed a question.

   Why did Falk, who is also the president of the UN Correspondents Association which has tried to get Inner City Press thrown out of the UN, “take and presumptively give to BuzzFeed photographs from Inner City Press' office?”

   Before the BuzzFeed story, which came out Friday afternoon and which noted that Falk declined to comment, Inner City Press had asked in writing and in the March 19 UN noon briefing why the president of UNCA, Falk, was allowed by the UN to be taking photographs of the raid.

   Falk never answered that question; nor to the UN, even when it was re-iterated to UN official Stephane Dujarric in writing.

   Now now on Saturday afternoon, Pam Falk who is a lawyer has sent not answer but a legal threat:

From: Falk, Pamela @cbsnews.com
Date: Sat, Mar 23, 2013 at 2:28 PM
Subject: Inner City Press
To: Matthew.Lee [at] innercitypress.com
Cc: "Falk, Pamela" @cbsnews.com

Dear Mr. Lee:

On March 22, you published the following statement, referring to me:

“Why did she take, and presumptively give to BuzzFeed, photographs from inside Inner City Press' office?”

I did not give photographs to BuzzFeed or to anyone else, and I did not take the photographs that BuzzFeed published.

Please cease and desist from publishing statements which are either inaccurate or cast my actions in a false light.

Pamela Falk

   There. We've run it in full, less than an hour after receipt. But in what light CAN we cast Falk's ghoulish photographing of the raid of Inner City Press' office on March 18?

  Falk has had numerous opportunities to clarify or just explain why she took the photographs, but has not. If she appears in a negative light it is largely Falk's fault.

   She bears other responsibility -- presumptively, of course. The UN has denied, through Dujarric, giving the photographs to BuzzFeed. They were given by an anonymous “Concerned UN Reporter” who is then quoted defending UNCA.

   Falk is the president of UNCA. Just as with her UNCA Executive Committee members defacing flyers of the Free UN Coalition for Access, and setting up anonymous social media accounts to try to undermine FUNCA and Inner City Press, Falk bears some responsibility, that no tin horn cease and desist letter with the term of art “false light” can solve.

  Falk, as we've reported, claimed to Inner City Press on February 22 that she was advised by lawyers -- herself? -- that for Inner City Press to contact media organizations including hers to ask their policies "might constitute a crime."

  Why has UNCA under Falk gone even further into the gutter, with false social media accounts? Again, why DID Falk take photographs of the UN's raid on Inner City Press' office, and search of its papers, on March 18?

  And what steps has Falk as UNCA president taken to identify which UNCA “leader,” if as she says not herself, obtained the photographs taken during the raid and forwarded them, anonymously, to BuzzFeed? We will have more on this. UNCA's in the gutter - but CBS and CBS News are hitting new lows daily. Watch this site.

March 18, 2013

As UN Denied Haiti Cholera, It Ignores Questions of Censorship, Ladsous Abuse

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, March 16 -- This UN thinks it can simply ignore or dismiss questions that are raised.

  In the big picture, there's the UN saying nothing for 15 months about the legal complaint that it brought cholera to Haiti, killing at least 5,000 people so far.

  Then after 15 months, the UN tersely said the claims were “not receivable.”

  Since then Inner City Press has asked a half dozen times for the legal reasoning or basis of the ruling. But the UN has refused to answer.

  In the smaller picture, Inner City Press for the Free UN Coalition for Access posed nine questions or issues to the chief of the Department of Public Information.

  Several had to do with the non-responses and insufficient responses of his subordinate, Media Acceditation and UNTV boss Stephane Dujarric.

  But all nine issues were re-referred to Dujarric. Of the nine issues, Dujarric denied two, dodged two, deferred on two and entirely ignored three others.

  Welcome to the UN.

  FUNCA asked, as the New York Civil Liberties Union did on July 5, 2012, that the UN state or adopt due process rules for journalists. Dujarric, like the chief of DPI to whom the NYCLU wrote, ignored the request.

  For Dujarric, this may be understandable, since of his own proved-false February 27 complained, he after 18 days of silence said “the letter stands.” Is that like, “not receivable”? It is unacceptable.

  Inner City Press reported that photographs taken of a visiting UN “partner,” Beyonce, were ordered to be deleted inside the UN's own Studio H. Dujarric response was to quietly raise the issue with Aramark, which is the UN's cafeteria contractor.

  This does not address the forced deletion of photos in the UN's Studio H, but Dujarric insists, falsely, that the issue raised by FUNCA has been addressed.

  Likewise after UN Peacekeeping boss Herve Ladsous had his spokesman seize the UNTV microphone on December 18 (video) to try to avoid an Inner City Press question about the 126 rapes in Minova by the Congolese Army Ladsous partners with, all Dujarric did was speak quietly to the spokesman.

  Now on March 15 Dujarric writes on “the issue of the handling of the microphone by one of the DPKO spokespeople. As I told you, it was an honest mistake and he has been told not to do it again (and has not).”

  What has happened, among other things, is the Greek foreign minster's entourage telling UNTV to stop recording and telling journalists not to take photos at the stakeout. DPI has refused to answer on this issue, raised by FUNCA on February 22 and since.

  As to Ladsous, his DPKO on March 7 gave a half-answer to friendly scribes other than Inner City Press to a question Inner City Press repeatedly asked Ladsous, and put to Ban Ki-moon on March 5, about the Minova rapes.

Here's #LADSOUS2013 short films 1, 2 (finacial), 3 (Too Late)

  Inner City Press has asked the chief of DPI “to be informed if it is DPI's role, or whose role it is, to ensure that such mis-direction and favoritism in the provision of information and answers by the UN does not continue.”

  The chief of DPI referred the question to Dujarric, who answered: “Regarding your concern about wanting more information about UN activities, as you know, this department has made a sustained effort to increase the number of briefings by senior UN officials from both headquarters and the field.”

  While some of the referenced "brown bag" sessions are appreciated, this does not respond to what Ladsous has done. When Inner City Press verbally expressed its opinion, Tim Witcher of AFP hissed “lies and distortions,” and Inner City Press replied, “Lapdog.”

  Now Inner City Press is being asked to respond to a complaint filed by Witcher and Michele Nichols of Reuters, no copy or even summary of which has been provided to Inner City Press.

  On this, Dujarric wrote back at 5 am Saturday New York time, from his “Roman Tablet” no less, to say the DPI has “yet to receive the complaints from DSS,” the Department of Safety and Security.

  So what ARE the rules? Inner City Press for FUNCA replied -- from its Russian Pancake, as the saying goes -- but that's for a forthcoming story: the pall cast on freedom of the press by all this will be energetically opposed. Watch this site.

March 11, 2013

On Congo Rapes, Ladsous' Policy Is 3 Strikes & MAYBE You're Out, Botching Ban Ki-moon's?

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, March 9 -- For 126 rapes in Minova by the Congolese Army with which the UN partners, the Department of Peacekeeping Operations under Herve Ladsous has adopted a policy of three strikes and MAYBE you're out, it emerged on Friday, March 8.

   After Ladsous refused questions from Inner City Press about the rapes on November 27, December 7 and December 18, on February 6 he told Inner City Press that the UN knew the identities of the major of the perpetrators.

   But then, when Inner City Press asked follow-up questions, the UN insisted it would not act until the Congolese investigation was finished: essentially, a rape grace period, as Inner City Press dubbed it.

  After Inner City Press on March 5 asked Secretary General Ban Ki-moon about Ladsous' rape grace period, suddenly on March 7 DPKO summoned in friendier scribes and told them that the UN wrote to the Congolese authorities on February 4 setting a deadline for them to take action.

These slavish stories appeared, for example by Ladsous' lapdog Tim Witcher of AFP, without identifying the Congolese Army units at issue or what the deadline was.

  On March 8, Inner City Press asked Ban's spokesman Martin Nesirky to explain this “information” and how it was given out.

   By DPKO's choice, Nesirky said, adding that a second “final” letter to the Congolese authorities had been sent February 18. But when Inner City Press asked if “final” meant that support to the units had at last been suspended, Nesirky said no.

   So Ladsous has turned Ban Ki-moon's claimed Human Rights Due Diligence Policy into three strikes and MAYBE you're out. Ladsous has debased his chosen lapdogs into writing stories without basic information, nor any notation that the missing information was requested but withheld.

   Why did Ladsous on February 6 take Inner City Press' question about the rapes and say the UN knew the identity of the majority of the perpetrator -- but NOT say that a letter was sent on February 4?

   Why did Ban Ki-moon not know or say this in responding to Inner City Press' question at his Security Council stakeout session about the Congo?

   Why then did DPKO on March 7 rush to tell scribes who had never asked about the rapes about the month-old February 4 letter, but not the February 18 “final” letter? What has happened since?

Three strikes and you're out might be applied to Ladsous. Click here to view the first, beta film #LADSOUS2013. Watch this site.

March 4, 2013

Haiti Cholera Dismissal Harms UN's "Corporate Reputation,” Ging Tells ICP

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, February 26 – Five days after the UN tersely dismissed the pending legal claim that it introduced cholera into Haiti, Inner City Press asked the director of operation of the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affair John Ging if the dismissal impacted the UN's credibility, even in aid delivery. Video here, from Minute 34:32.

  Ging acknowledged that it did. After answering another Inner City Press questions about Sudan, he said of the Haiti dismissal, “of course those of us working for the UN feel the impact of the debate... it affects our corporate reputation, of course.” Video here, from Minute 37:54.

   As the UN has refused to provide the legal reasoning for its dismissal, and brags instead about new missions it plans in Mali, new brigades in Eastern Congo, this impact seems not to have been taken into account.

  Nor has the Department of Peacekeeping Operations under Herve Ladsous been willing to answer Inner City Press' simple question of what safeguards if any have been implemented to avoid the UN spreading cholera elsewhere.

  Ladsous at first outright refused to response to the Inner City Press question, then after complaints by the Free UN Coalition for Access, he responded but did not answer. He described UN programs on clean water, after the fact, but nothing about DPKO-wide safeguards.

  Ging said that “no OCHA colleagues have had cholera, in Haiti.” That is clearly not true of the peacekeepers under Herve Ladsous' command. But what has he done about it? Watch this site.

UN Won't Explain Its Rules or Complaint to ICP, As Reuters Ascribes Its Fear-mongering to Unnamed Diplomats

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, March 2 – When the UN falsely accuses an investigative journalist of using quotes, from a session the journalist said openly and loudly was “on the record,” what should happen?

  One might expect the UN official who sent the false allegation in writing, and was immediately asked for an explanation including of the purpose of the letter and the procedures for rebutting and striking it, to explain.

  But in this case the sender, the boss of UN Media Accreditation Stephane Dujarric, has not responded in more than two days.

  The UN maintains and favors a so-called United Nations Correspondents Association, all the way back to the time of the League of Nations, which it claims represents and even defends the interests of journalists.

  But in this case, the apparently embarrassing quotes the UN's Dujarric was complaining were used were from UNCA President Pamela Falk of CBS (who yelled that Inner City Press is a “mugger” and bellowed, “you call yourself a journalist”) and UNCA First Vice President Louis Charbonneau of Reuters.

Click here for audio where Inner City Press tells them “you are on the record.”

  UNCA is the source of the attack on lawful reporting, not the solution. This was the case in 2012 as well, when as reflected by documents obtained from Voice of America under the US Freedom of Information Act UNCA met with the UN “very quietly” to move to get Inner City Press thrown out.

  Inner City Press has asked Dujarric several times, including in response to his false February 27 letter, to describe his knowledge and role in the referenced meeting with UNCA -- without response.

  At the reported-on February 22 meeting, Inner City Press yet again directly asked Charbonneau to describe his knowledge of and role in the meetings with the UN to get Inner City Press thrown out. Charbonneau refused to answer.

   Instead, Charbonneau along with saying to Inner City Press “the fundamental problem is your website” also told Dujarric and others present that unnamed diplomats asked him, given Inner City Press' reporting, if he is not concerned for his “personal safety.” Audio here.

  Inner City Press immediately assured Charbonneau that he had absolutely no basis for concern, if his concern / complaint to Dujarric was genuine -- a big if.

  Since seeing the VOA documents showing that Reuters among other things was moving toward the same route of throwing Inner City Press out of the UN, Inner City Press has not spoken with Charbonneau for six months.

  By contrast to Charbonneau's unnamed diplomats -- one wonders which of the two Security Council spokespeople who follow the UNCA leaders' counterfeit social media account it might be -- Inner City Press recounted the use of another of the UNCA leaders' anonymous social media accounts to malign Inner City Press and the Free UN Coalition for Access to a specific Security Council mission's spokesperson.

  Inner City Press said the name of the mission, then added that the name would continue to go unreported, to protect a woman who while there alleged past sexual harassment (and was mocked by UNCA leaders then, and later in a flyer they posted on Inner City Press' UN cubicle door).

  Apparently Dujarric -- and / or UNCA -- latched onto this one segment being without name to try to claim that nothing from the meeting should be quoted.

   It's ludicrous and could easily have been disproved had Dujarric simply asked, for example at the “brown bag lunch” session he and Inner City Press both attended, hours before he sent his complaint letter.

  But Dujarric said nothing.

  Now others in the UN say that the letter “is not innocent” and Dujarric's goal is to “build a case” against Inner City Press. There has been no retraction or amplification, not even any response.

  This shows ever more clearly the need for rules of due process for journalists at the UN, as the New York Civil Liberties Union asked the UN Department of Public Information about in mid-2012, referring to Voice of America's request to Dujarric to “review” Inner City Press' accreditation, which Dujarric thanked VOA for but never told Inner City Press about.

  When we he going to tell Inner City Press? In the absence of any written answer or rules, we can only reply on the oral answer given, yes, on the record.

  That answer was that only AFTER dis-accredition and ouster from the UN would the underlying complaint be shown. That is a travesty, as is the February 27 letter and failure for two days and counting to explain, amplify and rescind it. Watch this site.

February 25, 2013

Free Speech, UN Style, Extends to Press Bulletin Boards, Single Standard Urged

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, February 22 – For some weeks, alongside Mali, Syria and Sri Lanka, Sudan, UN corruption and the Congo, Inner City Press has been reporting on a free speech issue inside the UN itself.

  Flyers posted by the Free UN Coalition for Access calling for reforms of UN accreditation rules and Media Access Guidelines have repeatedly been torn down, counterfeited, defaced with slogans like “Looney Club" and worse.

  FUNCA held a number of meetings with officials of the Department of Public Information, mostly to push for its top ten reforms (including for example eliminating the requirement that a journalist must agree with the unspecified “principles of the UN” in order to be admitted to cover it) but also about free speech.

 First on January 24, the UN itself threatened to tear down FUNCA's flyers. Then after advocacy, sometimes more heated than it might have been - those deserving an apology got one, in fine FUNCA fashion -- this tear-down was postponed.

  UNCA "leaders" continued with the campaign, expanding it.

  While the simplest solution would have been to open up the glassed-in bulletin board maintained by the UN Correspondents Association, on which without naming any UNCA officials a letter denouncing Inner City Press was displayed behind glass for five months in 2012, the UN has proposed another solution.

  Late on the afternoon of Friday, February 22 (four weeks after the ostensible postponement of tear-downs) the UN's Media Accreditation and Liaison Unit (MALU) announced:

A board will be installed at MALU square most likely next week. In the meantime, correspondents can start putting information up in the designated area (look for the press board sign across from the mailboxes). The board is for all correspondents who have a valid accreditation and want to share information about their activities or issues related to the media at the United Nations Headquarters.

RULES FOR POSTING FLYERS ON ALL BOARDS IN THE PRESS AREA

-Only correspondents with a valid accreditation can put up a flyer.

-All flyers must be related to press events or issues related to the press at the United Nations Headquarters.

-Insulting language, attacks on other correspondents or groups of correspondents or any information that violates UN principles will not be permitted.

-All flyers must include contact information (name, telephone and/or email) of the person who posts it.

-Only one copy of each flyer can be posted on the board.

The Media Accreditation and Liaison Unit will remove any flyers that are not complying with these rules.

  This last should, of course, apply to the glassed-in UNCA bulletin board, on which they displayed a five page letter attacking the investigative Press for five months in 2012. A problem remains with "separate but (un) equal," with the UNCA glassed-in board.

As we reported and asked earlier this afternoon in connection with a UN Alliance of Civilizations press conference that turned into an advertisement for the German car company BMW, who partnered with the UN AoC, sponsoring and promoting their UN press conference on Friday?

  Without mentioning the name of any officials, it was the UN Correspondents Association. To be diplomatic we'll only for now note that there has been more serious controversy about UNCA sponsoring events in the Dag Hammarskjold Library Auditorium -- click here for one example -- and more recently, this week, demanding the first question from Bolivia's president Evo Morales, even when he repeatedly said no, he had recognized another (Latina) journalist first.

   There has been no mea culpa about this fiasco, even after the next day's doubling-down. What about this sponsorship of what became, in essence, an attempted advertisement for BMW?

  Without naming the names of officials -- there seems to be some sensitivity about this -- the question is raised, like the question of documents obtained under the US Freedom of Information Act like this one. And the questions should be answered. Watch this site.

February 11, 2013

Yemen Eclipsed by Weapons Seizure & Iran Sanctions Committee, No Drones

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, February 7 – Yemen has been cited as one of the Security Council's successes, about which it remains very concerned.

   But Thursday's sixty-day briefing by UN envoy Jamal Benomar attracted interest mostly due to the allegation that weapons seized by the government came from Iran.

  Outside the closed door meeting, Western diplomats primed the pump speaking about a request from Yemen's Hadi government to “the relevant sanctions committee” to investigate the weapons – that would be, the Iran sanctions committee.

  Thus primed, when Benomar came out to the stakeout, after he vaguely referred to spoilers – which would seem to refer to Ali Saleh – he was asked by a wire service much concerned about Iran if the arms shipment from Iran (“allegedly” from Iran, it was quickly pointed out) was indicative of the spoilers he referred to.

  Benomar answered, never naming the committee to which the complaint was directed. But it is the Resolution 1737 Committee, the Iran Sanctions committee.

  Non-western diplomats who had been in the meeting told Inner City Press that the weapons and Iran was a part, but not the majority, of the discussion. But the Iran angle was being pushed and promoted outside.

   Inner City Press asked Benomar about the promised but delayed Transitional Justice law. He said the UN would like to see discussion of a new law, that comports with international standards. Would that remove immunity from Ali Saleh?

 During the Security Council's trip they were told by Nobel Peace Prize winner Tawakkol Karman and others that Saleh must be removed from politics.

   Benomar complained how little of the $8 billion pledged to Yemen has come through. He did not directly mention it, but there have been protesters in front of the Council of Ministers office, amid calls for a new uprising, surrounded by the Fourth Armoured Brigade.

   As the session broke up, Inner City Press asked UK Permanent Representative Mark Lyall Grant if the weapons allegedly from Iran took the focus away from the Yemen transition issues.

  Lyall Grant told Inner City Press that while there is a move for a press statement on the weapons issues – Inner City Press understands that China on Thursday said it had to check with Beijing – there is also a move for a Presidential Statement on the Yemen issues.

   But will the weapons allegedly from Iran dominate some coverage? We will bet, yes.

   While the Council met behind closed doors about Yemen, in the Senate in Washington prospective CIA director John Brennan was questioned about torture, Benghazi, leaks and especially drones.

  Protesters unfurled signs; chair Diane Feinstein excused the killing of American citizens by drones since those targeted were “not upstanding.” (“Not anymore,” remarked one wag.)

  UN special rapporteur Ben Emmerson was reported to "endorse" Brennan as US CIA chief - strange, for a UN affiliated person.

   Inner City Press at the UNTV stakeout tried to ask Benomar a question about drones, about the US drone base in Saudi Arabia. But there were more Iran questions to be fielded, a whole machinery to be fed.

  If even the Western members of the Security Council acknowledge that the weapons allegedly from Iran was only a small part of Thursday's discussion, why it is pitched, accepted and promoted as the main story?

Sanctions footnotes: On another sanctions front, after the meeting the Permanent Representative of Eritrea knocked on the door to get into the Security Council. He told Inner City Press it was to deliver a letter to the chair of his (and Somalia's) sanctions committee.

  There's talk of removing the arms embargo on Somalia. But will the Council do it? Watch this site.

On DRC & Sudan, After Ban Ki-moon Spoke to UNCA's 13 Opaque Apostles, No Transcript?

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, February 9 – The day after UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon's spokesman Martin Nesirky refused to provide any transcript of Ban's February 7 session with 13 members of the UN Correspondents Association Executive Committee, one of member was asked by FUNCA to release his tape to all reporters accredited at the UN.

  Nesirky acknowledged that beyond the four-paragraph, three issue highlights belated provided to reporters beyond the UNCA 13, Ban spoke about the Democratic Republic of Congo and about Sudan. But neither was in the highlights.

  The omission or withholding of DRC information echoes the UN's January 25 doling out of anonymous quotes essentially declaring war in the Congo with a "peace enforcement" batallion that those media running the quotes said would be approved that weekend in Addis Ababa.

   That did not happen, but there were no corrections, no accountability.

   What did Ban say this time on DRC?

  But Nesirky replied, “no, we will not provide a full transcript. Part of the conversation was on the record, part of the conversation was off the record.”

   This implies that Ban and/or Nesirky only trusts these UNCA Thirteen to abide by off the record requests.

   But are these 13, the apostles of opacity, the only ones who could be trusted? And should they be trusted?

   As noted, Inner City Press had rushed to the day's noon briefing, to ask the transcript question on behalf of the Free UN Coalition for Access, arriving just at noon from an 11 am off the record briefing at a Security Council's member's mission

  There, and subsequently on an anonymous social media account involving UNCA Executive Committee members and in a flyer posted on the door of Inner City Press' cubicle at the UN, a woman who before the off the record briefing alleged past sexual harassment was mocked, with involvement of at least some of the 13.

   We add “some of,” because UNCA Executive Committee member Denis Fitzgerald wrote it to state that he was not at briefing at the mission and is not “part of a fake social media account.” His statement was added less then 20 minutes after he sent it.

 Fitzgerald was in the UN Photo of the 13 with Ban, re-tweeted by UNCA President Pamela Falk.

Ban Ki-moon's UNCA Lunch of the Lost, Feb 7, 2013, credit Evan Schneider, UNPhoto. From left: OSSG's Del Buey; Denis Fitzgerald of Saudi Press Agency; OSSG's Nesirky; Melissa Kent of CBC; Sylviane Zehil of L'Orient le Jour; Tim Witcher of AFP; Ali Barada of An-Nahar; Ban Ki-moon, Kahraman Halicelik of Turkish Radio & TV; Pamela S. Falk of CBS; Lou Charbonneau of Reuters; Bouchra Benyoussef of Maghreb Arab Press; Yasuomi Sawa of Kyodo News; Masood Haider of Dawn; Unknown; Zhenqiu Gu of Xinhua; Stephane Dujarric of UN DPI

 Others in the photo who WERE at the referenced mission's off the record briefing included Louis Charbonneau of Reuters; Tim Witcher of AFP; Ali Barada of An-Nahar; Kahraman Halicelik of Turkish Radio & TV; and Masood Haider of Dawn, as well as several members of the board of UNCA's affiliate the Dag Hammarskjold Fund for Journalism.

   After Fitzgerald's statement was added, less than 20 minutes after he sent it, Fitzgerald was directly asked, by the Free UN Coalition for Access, three questions including to “release any and all recordings of the February 7 session with Ban Ki-moon to all reporters accredited at the UN.”

  We believe the request is fair for the following reasons:

  While Fitzgerald is employed by the Saudi Press Agency and also maintains a small blog named UN Tribune (the last post on which is an uncritical transcription of the UN Peacekeeping chief on drones), it is clear he was only at the Ban Ki-moon February 7 briefing because he is an UNCA Executive Committee member.

  Of all reporters covering the UN, only the 15 UNCA Executive Committee member were invited. Thirteen went.

  The UNCA Executive Committee purports to represent and serve at least the other UNCA members, if clearly not the resident correspondents who are not members of UNCA, nor the vast majority of other reporters who cover and even enter the UN.

  But the UNCA Executive Committee members did not distribute the information they obtained even to other UNCA members. Now the request has been formally made – and the response, disingenuous, is only, Who is FUNCA? Who indeed.

 February 4, 2013

After Jumping Gun on DRC Drones, UN Procurement Open Through March

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, January 31 -- The UN Department of Peacekeeping Operations and its chief Herve Ladsous have said that they need surveillance drones in the Democratic Republic of the Congo on an emergency basis.

  But, Inner City Press has learned in UN procurement records, it will be months before the UN can have even a single drone -- at least in the legally provided way.

  The "new" procurement that the UN described on January 30 in response to Inner City Press' questions of the two previous days remains open, the records show, through March 2013. Some emergency.

  As Inner City Press exposed on January 25, Ladsous' DPKO even started the procurement of drones back on November 28, 2012 -- fifty days before having a single approval to even try drones on a case by case basis.

  At the UN on Monday, January 28, Inner City Press asked about this discrepancy:

Inner City Press: I wanted to ask you about drones. It was said here on Friday that the procurement had been launched by DPKO and in looking into it, it looks like the procurement began 28 November and ran through 11 January. So, it looks like DPKO started procuring drones for West Africa and Central Africa before they had any approval, even this most recent letter from the Council. So on what basis did DPKO begin procuring drones, and is it, in fact, the case that they intend to use them in West Africa, as the procurement document states?

Deputy Spokesperson Eduardo Del Buey: Well, I will have to find out on both issues for you.

  But 24 hours later, Del Buey and ultimately Ladsous' DPKO had provided no answer or information. So Inner City Press asked again at the noon briefing on Tuesday, January 29:

Inner City Press: yesterday I had asked you about this procurement of drones this year and I still haven’t heard anything back, I am not blaming you, maybe it is DPKO , but it seems like it is a straight forward question: Why did they begin the procurement before they had any approval?

Deputy Spokesperson Del Buey: Well, we have, we’ll have to speak with DPKO on that, but have you spoken with DPKO yourself?

Inner City Press: As you know, I have asked Mr. Ladsous questions a number of times that he refused to answer.

Deputy Spokesperson Del Buey: But, have you spoken with DPKO, the media people of DPKO?

Inner City Press: My last interface with them was them taking the microphones, so questions couldn’t be asked at the Security Council stakeout, so I am asking you.

Deputy Spokesperson: Well, the media are there, but we’ll try and get the answer for you.

  The next day January 30 Del Buey after reading out an indirect denunciation of Inner City Press from the same DPKO whose chief Ladsous refuses to answer questions announced to the noon briefing:

I was also asked yesterday about the recent procurement process for Unmanned Aerial Vehicles, or UAVs, and I have the following to say: On 25 January 2013, the UN Stabilization Mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo launched the procurement process for UAVs, issuing a request for proposals that called for interested vendors to submit their offers.

What was issued in November 2012 was a request for expressions of interest, a common practice by the procurement division to expand its register of equipment-specific vendors. This practice helps ensure that, when the need for that particular equipment arises, the requirement is sent to the widest possible pool of vendors.

  This was re-reported, as such; further inquiry by Inner City Press finds this UN procurement

PROVISION OF ONE (1) UNMANNED AERIAL SYSTEM (UAS) FOR THREE (3) YEARS PLUS TWO (2) OPTIONAL YEARS IN MONUSCO

  But this remains open until the second half of March. What emergency? Watch this site.

January 28, 2013

UN Declares War in Congo Via Official Left Nameless by AFP, Reuters & BBC

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, January 26 -- Should UN officials be allowed to declare war anonymously?

  Today Reuters from the UN in New York runs a quote that "'It is not simply peacekeeping, this is peace enforcement. It's a much more robust stance,' said the official, who declined to be named."

  Why did Reuters accept this request for anonymity from a UN official on a concept -- "peace enforcement" -- that not all UN member states, particularly troop contributing countries, have agreed to?

  BBC has the same blind quotes, without explaining or even mentioning that the UN official declined to be named.

   Agence France Presse goes further, or lower, allowing a "second UN official" to also go unnamed.

  After the UN failed in the Democratic Republic of Congo to protect civilians first in Goma then in Minova, where the DRC Army raped at least 126 women in late November 2012, a reserve spin war began.

  UN Peacekeeping chief Herve Ladsous refused to answer Press questions about the Minova rapes, instead taking favored and compliant media out into the hall for a private briefing. Video here. These media included Reuters, Agence France-Presse and Voice of America.

  Now it's gotten worse. On January 25, 2013 AFP, Reuters and the BBC at the UN allowed an "unnamed UN official" to essentially declare war in the Congo.

  Why grant anonymity? Is this a whistleblower? Or a failing UN official?

 On the media, what are the policies on granting anonymity in cases like this for Reuters editors like Stephen J. Adler, Walden Siew, and Paul Ingrassia, for Agence France Presse, for BBC?

  In terms of the UN, isn't this "inter-governmental organization" owned and supposedly by its member states? Many of them, particularly troop contributing countries, have not agreed to Ladsous' "peace enforcement" push, nor in the C-34 committee on peacekeeping have they signed off on his proposal to use drones.

  But Ladsous, Inner City Press yesterday reported, ran a procurement for drones from November 28, 2012 to January 11, 2013, before he had any approval at all. Another UN official in the mix is Susana Malcorra, sent to the region as the Personal Envoy of Secretary General Ban Ki-moon. But Malcorra promised to be more transparent, after defending the UN's blacking out of material about war crimes. We'll see.

  What right do high UN official have to declare war anonymously? And why do AFP, Reuters and the BBC serve as pass throughs in this way?

  Of note in this is the role of the decaying UN Correspondents Association. When Ladsous became the last minute replacement for Jerome Bonnafont as France's official to succeed their own Alain Le Roy atop UN Peacekeeping and Inner City Press reported it, AFP's Tim Witcher launched a process in UNCA to "take action" against Inner City Press.

  He, the BBC reporter and Reuters are all on the Executive Committee on UNCA, two elected without any competition after their terms expired.

  Ultimately he and Louis Charbonneau of Reuters supported Voice of America's June 20, 2012 request to the UN that Inner City Press accreditation be "reviewed."

  This led the New York Civil Liberties Union to ask public questions about due process for independent journalists at the UN, questions that the UN has yet to answer.

  Then in December 2012 when Ladsous went so far as to have his spokesman seize the UNTV microphone so Inner City Press could not ask Ladsous a question about the now 126 rapes in Minova by the UN's partners in the Congolese Army, UNCA did nothing. Video here.

  UN official Stephane Dujarric claims he told Ladsous' spokesman not to do it again -- but never told anyone until a January 17 meeting when he and another UN official, Peter Launsky-Tieffenthal (we name officials) were Pressed by the new Free UN Coalition for Access on the UN's further decline in transparency.

  But now this UN machinery and its servile press allow a UN official to declare war anonymously. A new low has been reached. Could they go lower? Watch this site.

UN Postpones Trashing FUNCA Fliers, Stonewalls on UNCA's Glassed-In Board

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, January 25 -- The UN on Friday suspended (or merely "postponed") its plan announced the day previous to tear down this coming weekend the critical fliers of the Free UN Coalition for Access, which challenge anti-press freedom moves by both the UN and its UN Correspondents Association.

   At Friday's noon briefing, Inner City Press on behalf of FUNCA asked Secretary General Ban Ki-moon's associate spokesman Farhan Haq to explain why fliers would be torn down, while UNCA maintained a glassed-in bulletin board which it has used to denounce other journalists.

   Haq replied that an answer would be forthcoming but so far, even to a formal request amplified on Friday afternoon, no explanation has arrived.

   UNCA, which in 2012 met with UN officials seeking the dis-accreditation of Inner City Press, since the launching of FUNCA last month has been defacing, counterfeiting and tearing down FUNCA's fliers.

   This has been a continuation into 2013 of censorship bids in 2012 when UNCA Executive Committee members demanded the removal of articles and photographs from InnerCityPress.com, concerning topics ranging from France and the fourth Frenchman in a row to head UN Peacekeeping, Herve Ladsous, to Sri Lanka and conflicts of interest.

   Both have been resisted: no articles were taken down, Inner City Press after fighting back was not dis-accredited, and now the anti free speech plan to purge fliers has been canceled or "postponed."

  Now with UNCA's claimed sole right to post information in the UN press floor, including denunciations of investigative journalism, it is ironic that UNCA President Pamela S. Falk of CBS on January 24 wrote to the UN that it is "creating a monopoly for UNTV that contradicts the spirit of a free press."

  As one FUNCA member remarked, takes one to know one. UNCA tries to have a monopoly, then belatedly argues against press corps losses it acquiesced in and in some cases suggested. (UNCA said it would make its letter "public," but it is not clear what that means.)

  Here is what the UN sent out after FUNCA's protest: "Given that time is needed for journalists to seek permission from BCSS to put up posters / flyers, MALU has postponed its enforcement to remove the posters/flyers from the corridors."

  But after the UN sent this out, a dozen FUNCA fliers were torn down, including right next to the office of UNCA President Pam Falk and UNCA's glassed-in bulletin board. This is the UN Censorship Alliance.

  The torn-down FUNCA fliers detailed UN official Stephane Dujarric's refusal to disclose the UN's policy on due process for reporters.

  Dujarric was asked after he processed a June 20, 2012 request for dis-accreditation by Voice of America, which said it had the support of Reuters and Agence France-Presse and of UNCA, which it said met "with UN officials (very quietly)" to get Inner City Press thrown out of the UN.

  Even the "BCSS" policy that was cited in the supposedly postponed threat to tear down fliers does not apply to FUNCA's. The BCSS guideline applies only to flyers defines as "a single page leaflet advertising an event or other activity sponsored by the Permanent Mission(s) and/or the United Nations department(s) and held on the United Nations premises -- Secretariat, DCI, DC2 and UNICEF."

  FUNCA is not a UN department or a country's Permanent Mission, and it is not advertising any event -- as for example UNCA for months advertised its $250 a plate December 2012 dinner dance celebrating Arnold Schwarzenegger. Those fliers did not have any BCSS stamp of approval.

  And so FUNCA has written to the head of the UN Department of Public Information:

We appreciate and will act on this afternoon's follow-up announcement, but it does not resolve the issues we have raised. It is to seek an ongoing and sustainable resolution that this letter / "application" is sent to you, with a copy to the two BCSS email addresses listed in the Policy MALU sent out yesterday.

  What is the legal status of the UNCA glassed-in bulletin board at the entrance to the media floor, on which UNCA in 2012 displayed a lengthy letter of denunciation?

Was that letter, and the other material posted there, approved by BCSS? There is no BCSS stamp on it.

Therefore it appears that no BCSS stamp is or should be required. FUNCA is hereby requesting approval and a bulletin board similar to that of UNCA, on which it will post its fliers with tacks.

In the alternative, the glass and key must be removed from the "UNCA" Bulletin Board, and its name changed to UN Journalists Bulletin Board.

We have asked and continue to ask that the so-called "UNCA Club" be renamed the UN Journalists' Club with equal access for all. Equal does not include UNCA keeping the key, just as it it could not for a UN Journalists Bulletin Board.

We are hereby applying for that, or for approval and a bulletin board for FUNCA announcements about the rights of journalists and free speech at the UN, which will be continuing, as before.

Finally, for now, among the unresolved "space" issues FUNCA objects to the planned lack of booth space over the Security Council and other UN organs, and questions why if this was planned long ago many, including impacted broadcasters, did not learn of it until recently.

   Later on Friday Inner City Press for FUNCA asked the UN Capital Master Plan why there are no plans for booths over the Security Council and other UN organs, and when and after what consultations this decision was made?

   Also, we appreciated your previous answer but don't fully understand it. The "lack of adequate labour due to increased demand for overtime-paying construction repair jobs" -- did the UN consider allocating more money to completing the "Permanent Broadcast Facility in the Conference Building"?

Was any estimate made of how much extra it would cost to finish as previously stated, in February? If not, why not? We ask in light of extra costs as in [other] Skanska change orders....

That negotiation process was not transparent -- it is for transparency that we are committed to continuing to post fliers, as currently or in as now request on an "approved" FUNCA bulletin board or unbranded (no longer UNCA) UN Journalists' bulletin board.

All of the other outstanding questions -- including the UN correspondents' due process question that was put by the NYCLU to the UN on July 5, 2012, are reiterated.

Watch this site.

From the UN's January 25, 2013 transcript:

Inner City Press: last night, the Department of Public Information put out a directive saying that there are no flyers allowed within the UN, regardless of what they say, including substantive comment, and what I am wondering is what is the UN’s position? On the right of free speech? Since these are flyers critical of DPI’s performance, can they take them down, and by what right does the United Nations Correspondents Association have a glassed-in bulletin board on which they have denounced other journalists?  Please explain.

Associate Spokesperson Farhan Haq:  I think this is an issue on which you need to talk it over with the Department of Public Information.

Inner City Press: I have written to Peter Launsky-Tieffenthal, and I don’t have an answer yet.

Associate Spokesperson Haq:  I am sure they will be in touch with you.  Thanks very much.
January 21, 2013

In Mali France Evaded "Algerian Element" in SCR 2085, Hostage Taking Followed

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, January 19 -- When the UN Security Council's Resolution 2085 on Mali was negotiated last month, safeguards were proposed and agreed too, steps that had to be taken BEFORE military action began.

  As Inner City Press reported at the time, Operative Paragraph 11 was called "the Algerian element" by one of its African sources on the Council -- an acknowledgment that a military offensive in Mali without following such steps could destabilize neighboring Algeria.

  But when France began bombing Konna in Mali on January 11, none of the safeguards had been followed. Instead, what followed was a large scale and now deadly hostage taking in Algeria.

  We have waited to write and ask this until, as French defense minister Jean-Yves Le Drian has now announced, there are no more French hostages in the In Amenas natural gas compound in Algeria.

  But simultaneously at the ECOWAS summit, French foreign minister Laurent Fabius has again claimed that France's military intervention is "in the framework of international legality." It wasn't and isn't.

  The "Algerian element" in UNSC Resolution 2085, agreed to be France, wasn't followed, and death there is what happened. Who is to blame?

   Consider Operative Paragraph 11 of Resolution 2085, particularly its final clause:

"11. Emphasizes that the military planning will need to be further refined before the commencement of the offensive operation and requests that the Secretary-General, in close coordination with Mali, ECOWAS, the African Union, the neighbouring countries of Mali, other countries in the region and all other interested bilateral partners and international organizations, continue to support the planning and the preparations for the deployment of AFISMA, regularly inform the Council of the progress of the process, and requests that the Secretary-General also confirm in advance the Council's satisfaction with the planned military offensive operation."

  Starting on January 12, Inner City Press asked the UN: did France get Secretary General Ban Ki-moon to "confirm in advance the Council's satisfaction with the planned military offensive operation" -- the details of which it seems Ban wasn't informed of?

  Were those steps and safeguards only applicable to AFRICAN intervenors?

  At the Security Council on January 14, French Permanent Representative Araud erroneously told Inner City Press that there was no French letter to the UN, only a Malian letter.

  But there WAS a French letter, and it did not mention UN Charter Article 51, which later became France's after the fact fig leaf for the bombing.

  On January 18, the French mission spokesman did not permit Inner City Press to ask Araud a single question, unlike on January 14 and unlike the other speakers on January 18, from Valerie Amos through Navi Pillay to Security Council president Masood Khan, who told Inner City Press that France had not updated the Council on Mali since January 14.

  Claiming that the request of the Malian authorities is also dubious, since as Araud himself admitted to Inner City Press, coup leader Amadou Sanogo has an official role in the Malian military.

  Again: the safeguards in UNSC Resolution 2085, agreed to be France, weren't followed, and death is what has followed. Who is to blame? Watch this site.

UN's Delayed Move, Favoritism in Responses & Space Raised by FUNCA, Some Reforms Won

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, January 17 -- Why has the UN delayed by two months the move-back of the press corps to its headquarters skyscraper? Inner City Press and other members of the Free UN Coalition for Access pursued the question Thursday afternoon with three officials of the UN Department of Public Information.

  Despite an initial diversion that construction workers at the UN are now focused on the Hurricane Sandy damage to the third sub-basement, it is confirmed that the UN can't or won't pay the now prevailing wage in New York for the workers need to meet the February deadline.

   And so it will be April, they say. Does the UN not have the money? Or does it have other priorities? This will be pursued.

   Many other questions were asked, and some answered. While some wire services are slated to return to large private offices, others are not.

   The issue was raised, and double standards identified including separate office spaces for three ostensibly independent outlets run by the same government's foreign service.

   In response, FUNCA was told that it is still a live issue. Here's hoping for the appropriate resolution.

    In terms of the lack of space for journalists, FUNCA pointed to the absurdity of the censoring and decaying UN Correspondents Association being slated to get an "UNCA Club" -- which should be renamed and be open to all -- an "UNCA Office" and even an "UNCA Pantry."

   This last is apparently only the designation in the blueprints. It was said the "Club" will be open to all. But it must be re-named; it cannot be a way for the UN to prop up the legitimacy of UNCA, which it was confirmed does not pay any rent to the UN for the space.

  Likewise, after complaints last fall and Thursday, the formal on the record response was that in the future, passes for resident correspondents to cover the General Assembly will no longer be distributed through UNCA, but through the Documents Center.

  Access to photo opportunities, argued for by a long time photographer who since being told only "wire services" could attend took to boycotting Secretary General Ban Ki-moon's events, was on Thursday guaranteed, even if it means two separate entries of photographers. Likewise, Ban's New York events will be disclosed in advance by the UN.

  Disclosure was the theme: FUNCA asked to be informed of all denials or revocations of accreditation. Cases of a television cameraman disaccredited for a single mistake were raised, as well as a critical journalist who was told the UN does not accredit freelancers. This will be tested, we predict by the National Writers Union.

   A complaint filed with the UN by the New York Civil Liberties Union, in response to a disaccreditation request filed by Voice of America which said that Reuters and Agence France-Presse supported it, was reportedly responded to, informally, the very day Inner City Press' accreditation was extended. (There may be a discrepancy on dates.)
 
   The actual response has not been provided but will be requested again by FUNCA. But such censorship, or non content neutral, dis-accrediation bids will be even more actively opposed by FUNCA in the future.

  More was said, but on other topics in an abundance of caution we will await DPI's promised written on the record answers.

  What FUNCA told the UN, on the record, is that UNCA went too far in not only not defending but actively seeking to expel and dis-accredit investigative press, and there is no going back.

   At this week's Kofi Annan book event, the new president of UNCA -- who ran without any competition, with the endorsement of the former four-year president, and issued no campaign statements -- told a newsy country's Permanent Representative, who in turn and amazed told Inner City Press about it, "I am the president of UNCA, not FUNCA." That's right - let's keep that straight.

   Going forward, the UN was told that FUNCA intends to be an ongoing mechanism to defend the rights of journalists to report from, and get answers from, the UN.

   FUNCA commended the new leadership of DPI for organizing "brown bag" presentations for UN officials like today's on Syria, and earlier by the Under Secretaries General for Security and for the Prevention of Genocide.

   The refusal of the USG for Legal Affairs Patricia O'Brien to ever answer questions was bemoaned. But will her replacement do better?

   And what will happen to the USG for Peacekeeping Operations Herve Ladsous, who had his spokesman physically seize the UN TV microphone to avoid a Press question about rapes in Minova by the Congolese Army, Ladsous partners?

  Ladsous' spokesman -- but apparently not Ladsous -- has it emerged been told that was inappropriate. But what of Ladsous and his refusal to answer?

  What of a sense among many at the UN that there are double standards, favoritism in question granting and answering? FUNCA is on the case - watch this site.

January 14, 2013

On Mali, France's Bombing Bypassed Dec. 20 Resolution, Ban Scammed?

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, January 12 -- France claims that its intervention and aerial bombardment in Mali, begun Friday, "resides in the framework of international legality." But the Security Council outcome France proposed and procured on January 10 was a mere press statement, non-binding.

  (Some have mis-reported a Jan. 10 "resolution," click here.)

  And so the framework that Francois Hollande and Laurent Fabius are referring to must be the Security Council resolution they procured on December 20.

   But there is a problem.

  As Inner City Press reported in December, Resolution 2085 contains in Operative Paragraph 11 a number of steps that are required before military action begins:

"11. Emphasizes that the military planning will need to be further refined before the commencement of the offensive operation and requests that the Secretary-General, in close coordination with Mali, ECOWAS, the African Union, the neighbouring countries of Mali, other countries in the region and all other interested bilateral partners and international organizations, continue to support the planning and the preparations for the deployment of AFISMA, regularly inform the Council of the progress of the process, and requests that the Secretary-General also confirm in advance the Council's satisfaction with the planned military offensive operation."

  Well placed African diplomats highlighted this to Inner City Press as the so-called "Algerian element." And now France has acted without any of the steps and safeguards in the resolution it drafted and championed and agreed to.

   Inner City Press asks: did France get Secretary General Ban Ki-moon to "confirm in advance the Council's satisfaction with the planned military offensive operation" -- the details of which it seems Ban wasn't informed of?

  Was this the meaning of Ban's statement after he got letters from France and Mali's post-coup government?

   Were French-drafted UNSC Resolution 2085's steps and safeguards only applicable to AFRICAN intervenors? Or is France's claim that its intervention, in which already at least 100 people have been killed, resides in the framework of international legality based only on a resolution they haven't complied with and a press statement that is not binding? Watch this site.

Footnote: Some surmise that France's timing -- beginning bombing on Friday, without coming back to the Security Council as at least one Permanent Five member's Permanent Representative said would probably happen -- is based on getting as much done "sur le terrain" as possible before having to brief parliamentarians on Monday. Ah, legality...

UNCA & VOA Said They Imposed Conditions on Free Press with Reuters & AFP Help, FOIA Shows

By Matthew Russell Lee

WASHINGTON, January 10 -- The final nail in the coffin of the UN Correspondents Association and its argument that its move to expel Inner City Press and get it dis-accredited from the UN was not about censorship or the content of its coverage is revealed by internal Voice of America documents obtained under the US Freedom of Information Act. New documents listed below.

  While the UNCA Executive Board was meeting daily demanding that Inner City Press take articles off the Interest, VOA's Margaret Besheer wrote to her bosses in Washington and described the "charges" against Inner City Press.

  All involved written content, ranging from UNCA conflict of interests involving Sri Lanka to coverage of the French Mission to the UN and French head of UN Peacekeeping Herve Ladsous.

  As previously reported, Besheer told her bosses that Reuters and Agence France-Presse, on one whose boards Ladsous served, both supported the move to get Inner City Press dis-accredited from the UN.

  A stealth complaint against Inner City Press by Louis Charbonneau of Reuters was fastened on by VOA as supporting its position.

   On June 20, VOA's Steve Redisch wrote to the UN's Stephane Dujarric asking that Inner City Press accreditation status at the UN be reviewed.

   Dujarric wrote back "thanks," and said he would call Redisch. Besheer wrote to Redisch and others in Washington, "thanks." Click here for that, published for the first time here.

This however was the turning point, new documents show.

  As recounted in e-mails from Besheer to her bosses in Washington, Inner City Press asking about the attempt to dis-accredit it at the June 21 UN noon briefing was a problem (along with publishing Redisch's request). Click here for that, published for the first time here.

  Later on June 21, the Broadcasting Board of Governors which oversees VOA was fielding requests from Congress about this attempt to get an investigative journalist thrown out of the UN.

  Inner City Press filed a Freedom of Information Act request, which UNCA's president, now outgoing, and past and apparently future First Vice President Lou Charbonneau told Inner City Press to withdraw the FOIA request.

   But Inner City Press does not withdraw FOIA requests. To the contrary: Inner City Press is a media amicus in this just filed brief in McBurney v. Young, No. 12-17 of the US Supreme Court.

By June 25, BBG officials were hoping for "no more surprises."  Click here for that, published for the first time here.

  By June 27, five Governors on the Broadcasting Board of Governors were asking for information and records, including those Inner City Press had requested under FOIA.

 One of the Governors started pushing for an open BBG meeting on the subject. Click here for that, published for the first time here.

   BBG's lawyers argued that it was somehow a "personnel matter," although Inner City Press did not and would not work for VOA.

  BBG's David Ensor wrote to the Governors and then Congress (but never Inner City Press or the UN) admitting that the request to get the UN to dis-accredit Inner City Press "was not appropriate."

  In preparing his late July spin, David Ensor wrote "the quote from Reuters will definitely help!" There's more, but for now this is enough.

  Ensor told the BBG Governors that Inner City Press had "been given a warning -- both verbal and in writing -- about his behavior when on UN premises." Redisch wrote that conditions had been imposed on Inner City Press using "UN rules regarding boundaries of coverage."

   No censorship? Hardly. And not only Voice of America, but the UNCA Executive Committee, particularly but not only Reuters' Lou Charbonneau and AFP's Tim Witcher, were instrumental to this censorship campaign.

   UNCA crossed a Rubicon of censorship. something is sick within UNCA, and its fixed election, ending today, will not fix it.

  The response of Inner City Press has been to launch a new and needed organization actually fighting for media rights with regard to the UN: the Free UN Coalition for Access, FUNCA. Its fliers have been defaced and torn down but there will be no stopping it. Watch this site.

January 7, 2013

At UN, South Africa Sangqu on Missions in Somalia, Mali & DRC, Fight for Fairness

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, January 3 -- After two years on the UN Security Council, South African diplomat Baso Sangqu held his wrap-up press conference on Thursday before taking up a new position in Addis Ababa.

Inner City Press asked Sangqu about the UN's relations with the African Union and African regional organizations, in Somalia, Mali and the Democratic Republic of Congo.

  In Somalia, just before South Africa left the Security Council, it led the push for the African Union position that the naval component of the AMISOM mission, that is Kenyan ships, should be made a compensated part of AMISOM. But this was rebuffed or deferred by the UK, which "has the pen."

  Sangqu hearkened back to the push for African peacekeeping in Somalia begun in the Council by his predecessor Dumisani Kumalo, and said the force should still be "re-hatted" and properly compensated.

   He called on the Council's other African members to keep up the push. Inner City Press will be asking new member Rwanda.

  Likewise on Mali, Sangqu said that the AFISMA mission should be paid for out of UN assessments, not only on a voluntary basis.

   On DRC he quoted Uganda's Yoweri Museveni on the MONUSCO mission having turned into military "tourism," and said discussion are underway that might -- might -- see South African troops in DRC serving in an international neutral force.

  In his opening statement, Sangqu brought up Western Sahara, an issue on which South African like Uganda before it has taken the lead in pushing the African Union position: referendum with self-determination as an option. Will Rwanda take that banner up, this year with Morocco on the Council, and then in 2014 without?

  Inner City Press for the Free UN Coalition for Access, FUNCA, thanked not only Sangqu but the rest of the South African mission team for their openness over the last two years.

  From Deputy Doc Mashabane to political coordinator Zaheer Laheer, from Cedrick Crowley to spokesperson Nomfanelo Kota, from its able representative on the 1540 Committee to its legacy in the current President of the General Assembly's office, it's been a good run. To be repeated.

Footnote, inside baseball: After Inner City Press said this thank-you on behalf of the new Free UN Coalition for Access, the fill-in representative of the old, some say outdated group cut in rudely, "Jesus Christ." Video here, from Minute 7:34. There was no need for it: certainly there must be room for two groups, multi-party democracy, in any UN with South Africa in it.

   But for now FUNCA fliers announcing its principles (Freedom, Fairness) are torn down. As was said* in the first 15 seconds of the archived webcast, video here, UNCA or its representative are "normally antagonistic."

  In fact in 2012 at least three of them tried to dis-accredit the Press, and met with the UN about it. And so, South Africa style, a new party or movement is born. Thank you, South Africa.

* - this was not a blooper but refreshing and needed candor. But will the UN now try to edit it out? Watch this site.

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, January 5 -- Four weeks ago the Free UN Coalition for Access was launched, calling for more accountability from UN officials to answer questions, for multi-party democracy and for more fairness in the UN's treatment of the different media which cover it.

  FUNCA was formed after a year in which the UN Correspondents Association first demanded censorship, then when that failed tried to expel the Press, then tried to get it dis-accredited from the UN.

  During this time, UNCA did nothing as some journalists were pushed out of office space, and others were disciplined with no due process.

  Now, FUNCA has raised cases of journalists denied accreditation to the UN, and disparate treatment in the allocation of work space even as the UN proposes to use dwindling resources and space on not only an UNCA "Club" but also an UNCA Office and even an "UNCA Pantry."

   Even as this long-time, some say decaying single party pushed back, scoffing when FUNCA asked questions and tearing down its fliers, the high road was taken.

   When for example in the South African mission's January 3 press conference FUNCA could have been called on first, it deferred to the older group, content to go second. But when it did, the initial questioner hissed, "Jesus Christ."

   Then on January 4 FUNCA's fliers with its statement of principles including Freedom of the Press, and UN Freedom of Information, were defaced and left up with "Looney Club" scrawled on them, and the word "media" crossed out.  Photo here.

   This then is UNCA's response.

   And so the critique becomes more specific. In the January 8-10 UNCA election, already delayed contrary to the group's supposed constitution, there is NO COMPETITION for the top six spots. Each candidate is running unopposed, as in North Korea.

   Four of the six are people who held the same position in 2012, when the UNCA Executive Committee went all out to expel and then sought to dis-accredit the investigative Press.

    So now we'll name some names.

   Louis Charbonneau of Reuters, past and prospective first vice president of UNCA, told Voice of America that Reuters supported the VOA letter to get Inner City Press thrown out of the UN, click here for document obtained under the Freedom of Information.

 Reuters discussed suing Inner City Press for what it wrote -- "Looney Club" indeed -- and made inquiries with the US Mission to the UN.

   FOIA documents were twice sent for comment to the entire UNCA Executive Committee, without response. (Also on FOIA, Inner City Press is a media amicus in this just filed brief in McBurney v. Young, No. 12-17 of the US Supreme Court: Looney Club?)

   Agence France-Presse' Tim Witcher told Voice of America that AFP supported the VOA letter to get Inner City Press thrown out of the UN, and would send its own letter. Witcher, like Charbonneau, is "running" again to stay on the UNCA Executive Committee, presumably to try use the post for Agence FRANCE Presse and himself.

   It was Witcher who back in September 2011 asked UNCA to take action against Inner City Press following its report that Herve Ladsous, the fourth Frenchman in a row to be put atop the UN Department of Peacekeeping Operations, was a last minute fill-in for Jerome Bonnafont.

  Jump cut to late 2012, when Ladsous emboldened by UNCA's anti-Press moves refused to answer any questions from Inner City Press, including about the 126 rapes in Minova by DPKO's partners in the Congolese Army.

  Then Ladsous took Charbonneau, Witcher and Margaret Besheer of Voice of America out into the hall. Is this then the "UNCA Hallway"? Or the real "UNCA Pantry"? Video here.

   On FUNCA's flier, the reference to Ladsous was defaced, implying Ladsous didn't answer the rape questions because they were not from "media."

  Who then were the questions from? And what type of media is it, that rarely even comes to ask questions, and then goes into the hallway with Ladsous like this?

   As noted in an earlier article about this "election," the views on all this of the new president-designate, nominated by the four-year president now outgoing, from censorship to dis-accreditation bids to (now) the defacing of FUNCA's fliers, are not yet known. It's increasingly like another succession recently discussed but barely acted on in the UN Security Council.

  From UNCA members current and past, it has been noted that in this current unopposed slate the top two UNCA posts would both be filled by Americans. It's been noted that nowhere in the Executive Committee is there any sub-Saharan African or African-American journalist.

   Is this the UN? FUNCA for its part will stay as far away as possible from this corrupt coronation which openly violates the UNCA constitution.

   FUNCA has told the UN Department of Public Information that the so-called "UNCA Club" should be designated more neutrally as the "UN Press Club," same with the laughably named "UNCA Pantry;" the separate "UNCA Office" should be given to the journalists long waiting for work space in the UN. Watch this site.

December 31, 2012

As UN Squeezes Press Out, Gives Space to NYT Which "Never" Comes

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, December 27 -- The UN, which preaches for rule of law all over the world, says that media organizations must come to its headquarters at least three days a week to be given office space and resident correspondent status.

  But as Inner City Press raised to the UN on December 27 during the UN's meeting announcing the layout of media space in the refurbished headquarters, the New York Times has not used or even entered its UN office since at least October.

  For more than a year, the New York Times has failed to comply with the three days a week rule. So why it is being assigned its own office, while other media have been told to leave?

   Inner City Press prefaced its question with "all due respect;" the Times is fine newspaper. But shouldn't they want to play by the rules? Shouldn't they have to, at the UN?

  A check by Inner City Press on December 26 found months' old fliers sticking out under the door of the New York Times' office, Room L-231. A long time correspondent concurred, "the Times is never here any more." UNTV archived video bears this out. Only the UN, applying a double standard it won't admit to, is in denial.

  This obvious double standard is emblematic of the UN. As regards media accreditation, 2012 saw an attempt to "review the accreditation" of Inner City Press, filed by Voice of America which said it had the support of Reuters and Agence France-Presse.

  All three are members of the UN Correspondents Association's executive committee, which on December 19 extended its term in office, to continue unchange, even nominating its successors.

  Even after the New York Civil Liberties Union asked the UN what rules applied to accreditation, and if Inner City Press was being challenged based on the content of its publications -- which among other things question the performance of Herve Ladsous, the fourth Frenchman in a row atop UN Peacekeeping -- the UN never responded with a set of rules.

  The UN, it seems, is all about who you know. How else to explain some freelancers being granted accreditation, and others being kept outside?

  After its experience in 2012, including on December 18 seeing Ladsous' Peacekeeping spokesman attempt to seize the UN TV microphone so that Inner City Press could not ask a question about UN inaction on the Congolese Army rapes in Minova, Inner City Press and others have founded the Free UN Coalition for Access, FUNCA.

  FUNCA has so far raised to the UN, for action, the appropriateness of Ladsous seizing the microphone and refusing to answer questions, the double standards in accreditation and now in the assignment of space, using the New York Times as the example.

 In full disclosure, while Inner City Press for FUNCA on December 27 raised cases of an Egyptian journalist on the now-longer waiting list for a space, and a photographer forced through the metal detectors, Inner City Press is depicted sharing space with an Asian news service, which is fine. Advocacy should be for those who need it.

  Under this UNCA's executive committee's watch, media space at the UN is being reduced by 40%. After this loss, rather than look at which media actually come to cover the UN, favoritism is the rule. The UNCA executive committee members have been well taken care of (by themselves).

   Voice of America is depicted with its own office with four seats, as is Agence France-Presse (which tried to coax or coach the UN into describing its criteria as something other than favoritism).

  Photographers and staff of AFP and Reuters, no matter how infrequently they come to the UN, are given White passes to allow them in without metal detectors, while smaller media who are denied space must pass through metal detectors and experience other barriers to coverage.

  In the floor plan, there is not only an UNCA Club -- there is an UNCA office, and even an UNCA Pantry. Why would the UN need to brand its kitchenette with its company union? What's going on here?

  There is not enough coverage of the UN -- on December 24, Inner City Press was the only media organization in front of the General Assembly covering its meeting on the UN's $5.4 billion budget. The answer is to allow in more people, and to treat them fairly. Watch this site.

December 24, 2012

Refusing Rape Qs, Ladsous Has Mic Removed from Press as UNCA Watches

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, December 18 -- Top UN Peacekeeper Herve Ladsous hit a new low on Tuesday, directing his spokesman to physically remove the microphone so that Press questions about the UN's knowledge of 126 rapes by Congolese forces in Minova could not be recorded. Video here.

  Afterward staff said in 13 years at the UN, they had never seen anything like it. Inner City Press was told that it, or the Free UN Coalition for Access, FUNCA, should file a complaint.

  The larger questions are why has Ladsous refused to answer questions about these rapes, by the Congolese army that the UN works with, on November 27, December 7 and now December 18?

  On November 27, Inner City Press asked about rapes at Minova, which the UN then downplayed as being 22. Ladsous refused to answer, then summoned favored correspondents, including one from Agence France-Presse who re-appeared on December 18, out into the hall for a private briefing. Video here.

  On December 7, after the UN had been forced by questions to up its estimate of the rapes to 70, Ladsous refused four times to answer a simple Inner City Press questions about Secretary General Ban Ki-moon's supposed Human Rights Due Diligence Policy, which would preclude Ladsous' MONUSCO mission from working with these Congolese Army units. Video here.

  Ladsous refused to answer. Since then, a profile of his stonewalling and abuse of UN Peacekeeping for the political interests of his native France has been published by Billet d'Afrique, here.

  On December 18, with the UN having just had to increase the count of rapes up to 126, it seemed inconceivable that Ladsous would not offer at least some answer.

  Two journalists were notified by Ladsous' office and appeared at the stakeout, including Tim Witcher of AFP who as an executive committee member of the UN Correspondents Association on May 25, 2012 signed a letter against Inner City Press, following a September 2011 a dispute about reporting on Ladsous.

   When Ladsous came out, these and Inner City Press went to the UN Television stakeout, where only the day before Inner City Press had asked another UN official, Valerie Amos, about the rapes in Minova. Since she does not run MONUSCO, she said she would have to look into it. Video here, from Minute 17:10.

But once at the microphone on December 18, Ladsous directed his spokesman Andre-Michel Essoungou to pick up the UNTV microphone and move it away from Inner City Press. The UNTV cameraman told him to put it back, that he had no right to touch it.

  Then Essoungou tried to use the boom microphone himself, even offering coaching on (non rape) questions that could be asked.

  Four times, when there was a lull, Inner City Press asked about the rapes in Minova, which FARDC units were involved. Ladsous never answered, finally walking away.

    Inner City Press was told it or FUNCA should file a complaint. Tim Witcher left - UNCA, which used to but no longer defends journalists' rights, is preparing a $250 a plane dinner-dance for December 19, honoring not a journalist but Arnold Schwartzenegger.

  It is worth nothing that it was only after the May 25, 2012 letter by five including Witcher, Lou Charbonneau of Reuters and Margaret Basheer of Voice of America -- these three went into the hall with Ladsous on November 27, video here -- did Ladsous decide he would no longer answer Inner City Press' questions.

  These questions have included his MINUSTAH mission's introduction of cholera into Haiti and why he has General Shavendra Silva of the Sri Lankan Army, depicted in the UN's own report as engaged in war crimes, as an adviser, now also inspecting Ladsous' Lebanon mission UNIFIL.

  This same UNCA, back in September 2011, allowed Silva to screen a war crimes denial film in the Dag Hammarskjold Library Auditorium, the fallout from which was reported by the Sri Lanka Campaign here.

  In June 2012, Voice of America stating in writing it had the support of "colleagues" at Reuters and AFP asked the UN to "review" the accreditation of Inner City Press. Letter here.

    The two other May 25, 2012 signers and UNCA Executive Committee members are, notably, receiving UNCA monetary prizes on December 19.

Ladsous and UNCA deserve each other, and flock together, in the hall. Video here. But shouldn't the UN be at least a bit better than this? The Free UN Coalition for Access will be pursuing this. Watch this site.

At UNCA, of Lyall Grant & Rice, Sri Lanka & Expulsion Links, Schwarzenegger Prized

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, December 19 -- As Ambassador Susan Rice entered Cipriani's on 42nd Street Wednesday night, Cipriani's security told a couple also trying to enter to wait, "Susan Rice is going in."

  "Are you joking?" retorted UK Ambassador Mark Lyall Grant. As he went in, the Cipriani's security guard said, "You don't have to touch me."  Inner City Press video here. Embedded below.

   Inside, the UN Correspondents Association was holding a $250 a plate dinner and giving an award to Arnold Schwarzenegger.

   Inner City Press, which in full disclosure has been questioning UNCA since it screened in the UN a Sri Lanka government film denying war crimes, treated this UNCA Ball as a news event, standing in front of Cipriani's and asking questions.

To a question about Arnold Schwartzenegger as a UN role model, is it appropriate, many entrants laughed and asked to go off the record. The majority then said No, it is not appropriate.

  German Permanent Representative Peter Wittig, who to his credit did not ask to go off the record, said diplomatically "I don't know him well enough."

  Another Security Council Permanent Representative was more emphatic, saying, "No, it's totally inappropriate, UNCA is a joke, come inside and I'll tell you more over a scotch."

   But Inner City Press did not accompany him in. After Inner City Press reported on the Sri Lanka propaganda film, and that Sri Lanka's Permanent Representative Palitha Kohona had in the past paid rent for a luxury apartment to UNCA's president, a process began to try to expel Inner City Press from UNCA, to whose Executive Committee Inner City Press had been elected.

   Then on June 20, 2012, after UNCA Executive Committee member Margaret Besheer told her employer (and US government agency) Voice of America that her colleagues from Reuters and Agence France-Presse supported her, VOA asked the UN to "review the accreditation" of Inner City Press. Click here to view VOA's letter to the UN.

   After Inner City Press obtained related documents under the US Freedom of Information Law, these three and other UNCA executive committee members did not respond to requests to explain or comment on the documents.

 (Nor have they answered two requests to know the agenda of their December 21 general meeting, or what they propose to vote on, even as they purported to remain in office past the December 31 expiration specified in the UNCA Constitution.)

   So is their UNCA a freedom of the press organization? Why did they choose Arnold Schwarzenegger to receive their award? Why did they award prizes to their own Executive Committee members, two of whose media organizations have purchased full page advertisements in the UNCA Ball publication?

   These questions were not answered. Outside, a habitue recounted how at the previous night's Cipriani event, for the Humane Society featuring Mike Bloomberg, a woman incongruously walked in wearing a fur coat. The crowd stopped talking; she left.

   Meanwhile Sri Lanka's Ambassador Palitha Kohona went in to the UNCA Ball -- without answering Inner City Press' question.

  If his deputy General Shavendra Silva of the Sri Lankan Army, depicted in the UN's own report engaged in war crimes, showed up, wouldn't it be similar to the lady in the fur coat? Except there would be no reaction. This is UNCA.

   Press freedom must and will be better defended at the UN in 2013.

  At a press conference earlier on Wednesday, Inner City Press on behalf of the newly launched Free UN Coalition for Access -- yes, FUNCA -- asked Secretary General Ban Ki-moon to ensure that his Under Secretaries General hold press conferences and answer questions without discrimination or censorship.

  This was a reference to USG Herve Ladsous of UN Peacekeeping, who has repeatedly refused to answer Press questions, about Silva, cholera in Haiti and most recently the Congolese Army rapes in Minova.

  Inner City Press' reporting on Ladsous gave rise to a process within UNCA, initiated by Tim Witcher of Agence France-Presse (on one of whose boards Ladsous once served, in another conflict of interest), to censure Inner City Press.

  On Wednesday night, Inner City Press did not witness Ladsous entering the UNCA Ball, but his spokesman Kieran Dwyer did go in. Shouldn't this be seen like the lady in the fur coat going into the Humane Society ball?

   But this is 2012's UNCA -- those engaged not only in war crimes but also censorship are invited and celebrated. But did they pay $250 for their tickets?

   Ban Ki-moon himself graciously invited Inner City Press to enter. In truth, it was cold outside. But it was from there that Inner City Press watched the spoof "BanFall" film produced by CNN's Richard Roth.

  And yes, not left on the cutting room floor but broadcast was a segment in which Inner City Press says "UNCA, you'll never take me alive," on the roof of the very same Dag Hammarskjold Library where UNCA screened the Sri Lanka war crimes denial film, with commentary from only Kohona and Shavendra Silva.

   It is full circle, and it is enough. 2013 will be different. Watch this site.

December 17, 2012

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, December 7 -- The UN claims to have a Human Rights Due Diligence Policy under which it will not work with or support military units or personnel who engage in abuses like rape.

   But Department of Peacekeeping Operations chief Herve Ladsous four times on Friday refused to answer a simple question: which Congolese Army units were in Minova during the 70+ rapes, and what's being done to ensure the UN does not work with them?

  See video here, and below, at Minute 0:22, 0:40, 1:34 and 1:49.

  Ladsous was at the UN Television stakeout ostensibly to answer questions about the Congo. After on November 27 refusing questions about the rapes in Minova, earlier video here, Ladsous on Decmeber 7 conceded rapes there, by the Congolese security forces.

   But he would not answer the key UN question: what meaning does the supposed Human Rights Due Diligence Policy, announced by Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, have?

  Afterward a range of diplomats from Security Council members and Troops Contributing Countries told Inner City Press Ladsous' stonewalling and choosing friendly questioners is making them look bad.  One used the old saw, "A fish rots from the head."

  Yesterday the UN Secretariat confirmed to Inner City Press that Ladsous' DPKO now allows Sri Lanka General Shavendra Silva, whose troops were depicted engaged in war crimes in the UN's own report, to "inspect" Ladsous' peacekeepers in Lebanon.

  Ladsous refused to answer Inner City Press' question about Silva. Yes, a fish rots from the head.

Previously on November 30, the military adviser of a a major TCC told Inner City Press Ladsous is the worst DPKO chief "ever," much worse than his predecessor Alain Le Roy.

   Le Roy was the third Frenchman in a row to head DPKO, but at least he was vetted. Ladsous as it turned out was rejected as a candidate by previous Secretary General Kofi Annan, a senior Annan aide has described to Inner City Press.

   And this time, he was a last minute, no-check fill in for Jerome Bonnafont, who bragged in India that he had the post. Clearly, this is no way to choose senior UN officials. But this UN is so out of control, it seems, no one can stop it.

  Ladsous began refusing to answer Press questions in late May, right after and latching onto other anti-press moves in the UN. These moves are related, and due to the vacuum of leadership will be confronted in 2013.

 On December 7, while refusing four times the Press question on the rapes at Minova and his Department's role and follow up, Ladsous and his spokesman directed the UN microphone to other questioners -- two of whom retreated to the hallway with Ladsous on November 27, video here -- and took questions not about the Congo.
 
  Ladsous was asked about Northern Mali, on which while in Paris he said nothing could be done under September 2013. When Inner City Press asked Ban's spokesman Martin Nesirky on whose behalf Ladsous was speaking, since the Security Council has not decided that, and some members think that too slow. Inner City Press asked if there was a transcript. But none has been provided.

  Ladsous also took a question about Syria -- anything but the Congo and his failure and cover up there, it seemed -- and repeated the answer in French and English, without including what he said in Paris about Salafists. And he was not asked. This is how this UN works, or doesn't.

  At Friday's noon briefing, Inner City Press asked Ban's deputy spokesman Eduardo Del Buey questions about the supposed Human Rights Due Diligence Policy (that he counldn't answer without DPKO, which has not been answering these questions), and if Ladsous would evenhandedly take questions, including on Minova.

"Mr Ladsous manages his own stakeout," Del Buey replied. But isn't there some absolute minimum that is expected of a UN official, given how much they get paid, taxfree?

The briefing itself saw TCCs disagree with some others on the mandate of MONUSCO. Ladsous is in no position to show leadership, and isn't, sources say. And so civilians suffer, under this UN. Watch this site.

December 3, 2012

On Rapes in Minova, Ladsous Calls Situation Fluid, Won't Say Which Units, Policy Question Dodged

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, November 30 -- When top UN Peacekeeper Herve Ladsous took questions Friday across First Avenue from the UN, he said apparently without irony that the MONUSCO mission has done a good job in Eastern Congo in the last two weeks.

  Inner City Press asked Ladsous about two specific places in the Kivus: Pinga, on which Ladsous previously refused to answer a Press question, and Minova where at least 22 women were raped after the Congolese Army retreated from Sake.

  Since the UN, specifically Ladsous' Department of Peacekeeping Operations, says it has a Human Rights Due Diligence Policy under which it will not work with or support rights abusers, Inner City Press asked Ladsous whether the Congolese Army units at issue will be named.

  Ladsous dodged the question - better than refusing it, as he did before - saying that the situation was "fluid." He said that Policy will be complied with.

  But when Inner City Press asked again the unanswered question, whether the units of the Congolese Army or FARDC in Minova at the time will be named, Ladsous did not answer at all.

  As Ladsous continued, including to say that he has no problem with the media, his spokesman seem to indicate that more information may be available.

   We hope it is, and await it, having two days ago emailed three of Ladsous spokespeople, and the two spokespeople of Secretary General Ban Ki-moon whom they copied, these questions on Minova:

"On Minova, (a) which FARDC units were present in Minova when the 21 rapes took place? (b) What was MONUSCO's presence in Minova during this time? (c) What and where are the "appropriate processes" through which DPKO will report? Are any of them public, so that compliance with the Human Rights Due Diligence Policy can be assessed?"

   As soon as these questions are answered, we will report the answers in full. Until then, we will keep asking.

   Inner City Press had to leave Friday's event, after several more statements, to continue to cover the Security Council debate on Women, Peace and Security. Ladsous spoke there, with no mention on Minova or abuses by the Congo forces that MONUSCO works with.

   Nor did no respond on the reports, including in TIME Magazine, that Mai Mai Cheka rebels decapitated civilians in Pinga and the MONUSCO peacekeepers there did nothing.

The event, entitled "Telling the Peacekeeping Story Better," was held across First Avenue at the International Peace Institute, on whose Syria program Inner City Press also recently reported / tweeted.

  The program of theStorytelling on Peacekeeping event is or will soon be here -- several of the other panelists and participants spoke movingly, for example about winning over a BBC reporter to the UN's work in Sierra Leone by actually explaning and answering questions about it -- and video should be available shortly (though UN Peacekeeping's link to it wasn't working at press time.) We may have more on all this. Watch this site.

On Palestine, US Pressure Gets Pacific Abstentions, Scorn at Slovenia, ICC Games

By Matthew Russell Lee, Exclusive

UNITED NATIONS, November 29, updated Nov 30 -- When finally the UN resolution on Palestine as an Observer State came to a vote, it passed with 138 in favor, 41 abstentions and only nine against.

  Inner City Press had predicted ten negative votes, even days before the vote. But things change.

  Ultimately the negative nine were the US, Palau, Micronesia, Marshall Islands. Panama, Nauru, Canada, Israel and the Czech Republic. Sources in the EU tell Inner City Press that the Czechs were flirting with abstention, but fell back to no.

  There were 138 votes in favor, and 41 abstentions. List here.

  A well placed European Permanent Representative, speaking exclusively to Inner City Press, expressed particular scorn for Slovenia, which after almost voting Yes, ending up abstaining.

   He told Inner City Press the Slovenian mission at the UN in New York pushed for a Yes vote, but couldn't get the capital to agree. And not having an Ambassador here, he said, was a problem.

  US pressure didn't get even ten "no" votes. But many Pacific Island states abstained. And, it was noted, Liberia did not show up. But neither did Ukraine, nor Madagascar. Two of these three accounted for small gap between Palestinian Mission's internal projection of 140, and the final 138 Yes votes.

  After the vote, Inner City Press asked UK Ambassador Mark Lyall Grant about his statement about abstaining because he could not get assurances such as Palestine not rushing to the International Criminal Court.

   Doesn't this cheapen the ICC and make it look like a political chip to be played?

   Lyall Grant gamely answered that the assurances sought were in order to permit the peace process.

   Inner City Press asked the Ambassador of Sudan, which introduced Palestine's resolution as this month's head of the Arab Group and whose president Omar al Bashir is under ICC indictment for genocide, about the UK's position.

  He replied that it is strange that a country that is a member of the ICC would ask another not to take a case there.

  Indonesia's Foreign Minister, when asked by Inner City Press if the blockage of Palestine from UN membership by the US veto in the Security Council militates for reform said, the rules are the rules. But for how long? One wanted to ask him about the Rohingya in Myanmar. Next time.

   When Palestine's Rial Malki came to speak, Inner City Press asked him about the ICC. He said that if Israel doesn't continue with settlements and aggression, then Palestine won't go to the ICC. And if they do? Watch this site.

One wag joked that perhaps Hamas, for Gaza, could go to ICC.

Footnote: more transient insights remain on Inner City Press' Twitter feed, here.

November 26, 2012

In DRC, UN Spun Failure As Allowing Monitoring, Then Silent on Minova

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, November 25, updated -- The inaction of UN peacekeepers under Herve Ladsous as M23 took over Goma and then Sake is one of the biggest UN failures in some time.

  A member of the UN's C-34, to which Ladsous first proposed drones in March of this year, has analogized it to previous UN breakdowns, such as in Srebrenica (not to say as in Congo's neighbor Rwanda in 1994).

  While the numbers in Srebrenica, which some put at 7000, were higher the structure is the same: the UN says it will protect a place, people gather and remain -- then the UN does nothing when the place is attacked. Here, the UN ended up saying it was better it did not fight. Better for whom?

  The UN also said that by not fighting, it could remain and "keep records." But how? And for whom?

  After Herve Ladsous refused again on November 21 to answer any Press questions, including "would MONUSCO defend Bukavu" and about the protests against the UN, Inner City Press on November 23 submitted simple questions in writing to Secretary General Ban Ki-moon's three top spokesmen.

  They forwarded the Congo questions to Ladsous spokesman Kieran Dwyer, who had been the one to tell UN personnel to make sure not to give the microphone to Inner City Press, to instead search for a friendly question "en Francais."

  Dwyer, who by that and other acts appeared to become something other than a spokesman, emailed a response to basic questions, I am looking into that, before 4 on November 23.

  A day and a half later, despite major developments and more UN failure on the ground, and the statement issued by a meeting of the International Conference of the Great Lakes Region, neither Dwyer or the other UN spokespeople have provide any of the promised responses to the questions.

  One awaits as of 11 am on Sunday at the UN in New York even any comment on the ICGLR plans, on which Inner City Press asked the three top UN spokespeople for UN "comments and plans on the roles assigned to it by what was announced."

  Surprising in light of its failure, the UN's MONUSCO mission, which did nothing as the M23 took over Goma, was assigned the task of standing between the new territory taken by M23 and the city of Goma, which the statement says M23 should leave - except, paradoxically, for its airport. So far, a full 24 hours after the communique, the UN has had no response.
 
  And now DRC President Joseph Kabila has said there will only be talks with M23 if they leave Goma first.

  On November 23, Inner City Press asked the UN to "please describe any and all of MONUSCO's interaction with or support of elements of the Mai Mai or NYATURA so far this year."

  On November 23, Ladsous' Kieran Dwyer replied, "I am looking into this." In the 43 hours since, no information has been provided. But it is widely reported that NYATURA fought alongside the Congolese army in Sake; and that the Congolese army when it retreated to Minova robbed people's houses and stores and committed rapes.

  And so questions have had to be asked, on the morning of November 24, of the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, including that "in Minova, there have apparently been rapes and looting by FARDC units as they retreated. Has anyone from OHCHR visited Minova?" No far, nothing.

  What was that again, about a benefit of not fighting being the ability to keep records?

  The UN has refused even to provide its records of its own damages. Inner City Press also asked Secretary General Ban Ki-moon's spokespeople to "please specify all damage or injury to UN system staff, facilities or property in the Democratic Republic of Congo since November 20, including but not limited to in Bukavu, Bunia, Goma, Kinshasa and Kisingani."

More than three hours later, all Dwyer responded with was, "I am looking into this." And as with the question above about Mai Mai and NYATURA, no information was provided in the 43 hours since.

  How could the Department of Peacekeeping Operations purport to have no answer to this? UN buildings have been set aflame, rocks thrown at cars, mortars reportedly fired at the MONUSCO base in Monigi. But after 43 hours, no information at all was provided.

  Back on November 21, it was Kieran Dwyer who for Ladsous asked UN personnel to not give Inner City Press the microphone as its question "would MONUSCO protect Bukavu" was asked.

  Inner City Press asked Ban Ki-moon's three spokespeople to "please state the Secretariat's position on its Department of Peacekeeping Operations' spokespeople directing staff of the UN Media Accreditation and Liaison Unit and UN Television / audio to hold the Security Council stakeout microphone away from Inner City Press, most recently by spokesman Kieran Dwyer on November 21."

  This question was paradoxically referred to Dwyer himself, and he did not purport to answer it or even claim "I am looking into it."

  There was another, entirely factual question about Herve Ladsous, including his role during and public (and private) communications about, the Rwanda genocide in 1994, to which Ban Ki-moon's spokesperson's office has replied only that "We do not comment on recruitment processes." We'll have more on this.

   Meanwhile, Ladsous' Department of Peacekeeping Operations is issuing short statements about the "background" and mandate of MONUSCO. When a Tweeter with three followers asked online why the UN and its humanitarian chief Valerie Amos didn't respond as in Somalia,  with AMISOM, the UN Peacekeeping account replied with MONUSCO's mandate.

   But when asked by a more active Tweeter with hundreds of followers why Ladsous does not resign after his failures, here, there was no response from UN Peacekeeping. And so others online answered the question themselves. Who will be held accountable? Watch this site.

Update: more than 24 hours after the ICGLR communique, and still without any responses from Ladsous' DPKO, the UN put out a statement in which Ban Ki-moon "calls on the M23 to immediately lay down their arms in accordance with the agreements reached in Kampala, and comply with the immediate withdrawal of their forces from Goma" and "is also determined to ensure that the United Nations presence in the Democratic Republic of the Congo be adjusted to respond to the evolving challenges in line with relevant Security Council resolutions on the Democratic Republic of the Congo."

  So why did the UN, evne under its mandate, do nothing in Goma, and why does it not answer since?

After Gaza Deal, Israel Talks Iran, Rice Opposes Observer State Status

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, November 21 -- For a week on Gaza, the Security Council met behind closed doors. Finally on Wednesday after the ceasefire was announced in Cairo, the Council agreed on a Press Statement.

  After President Hardeep Singh Puri read it out, Inner City Press asked him about the delay, and what role if any he thought the Council had in the reaching of the ceasefire. He said it was not yet time for assessments, but at least "we got an outcome."

  But what outcome? Inner City Press asked Israel's Deputy Permanent Representative Waxman is the deal means ships to Gaza will no longer be intercepted, but only inspected. He answered that the week showed the volume of weapons Iran is getting into Gaza.

  When Moroccan Ambassador Loulichki, who represented the Arab Group throughout the week, came out Inner City Press asked him what impact he thought the week would have on the November 29 voting on Palestine's resolution to upgrade to Observer State status at the UN.

  Loulichki said that it should be kept separate, that the position of regional groups remains the same. Earlier in the day Hardeep Singh Puri, this time representing the IBSA grouping of India, Brazil and South Africa, read out a statement on Gaza that included support for the Palestine move for Observer State status.

  When US Ambassador Susan Rice came out, and after she gave a well-prepared answer to a question on her TV appearances on the attack on Benghazi, Inner City Press asked her about Palestine's application:

Inner City Press: I'm going to ask you a Gaza question although I definitely respect the right of people to ask a follow up to that [Benghazi]. I just wanted to ask you one-on Palestine, the controversy here at the UN about Palestine seeking observer state status. You heard Ambassador Loulichki say there's no relation between the fighting in Gaza and the vote, and Israel obviously said states should think again. The U.S. opposes the vote, but what effect do you think this week of fighting-do you agree that this shows that the Palestinian Authority has no control over Gaza? Should it make fewer states vote in favor of Palestine becoming a state observer at the UN?

Ambassador Rice: Well, I'll let other states comment on how they see the Palestinian bid for observer state status in the General Assembly. From the United States' point of view, we've been very clear. Our goal remains a negotiated, two-state solution. A Jewish democratic state of Israel living side by side in peace and security with an independent, viable Palestinian state. The only way to accomplish that in the real world is through direct negotiations, and we continue to urge the parties to come back to the table and to resume those direct negotiations. We view unilateral steps, including the bid for upgraded status to statehood-observer state status at the General Assembly-to be counterproductive and not take us closer to that goal, and, therefore, we strongly oppose it.

We'll be here on November 29, and until and after then. Watch this site.

November 12, 2012

At UN, States Get Palestine Resolution for Observer State Status, Vote "Near Future"

By Matthew Russell Lee, Exclusive

UNITED NATIONS, November 8 -- Two days after the US elections, Palestine's Observer Mission to the UN on Thursday sent to UN member states its draft resolution to upgrade its status in the General Assembly.

  Inner City Press has obtained a copy of Palestine's draft resolution, and puts it online here.

  After recalling and stressing many things, the resolution would grant Observer State status, and hope that the Security Council grant full status.

  In the interim, Palestine has had win and losses in getting seated in UN bodies, as Inner City Press has reported, from the Arms Trade Treaty through the Law of the Sea to Geographical Names.

Now, Palestine has written to member states:

Attached please find note verbal MI.274/12 regarding a draft resolution on the enhancement of the status of Palestine in the United Nations General Assembly to be considered by the Assembly at a date to be announced in the near future

Best Regards,

Permanent Observer Mission of Palestine to the United Nations

How will the US (and EU and others) respond? Watch this site.

At UN on Genocide, Burying Sri Lanka Report, Rwanda's French Connection

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, November 7 -- It was a snowy Wednesday evening when the UN held a screening and panel discussion entitled "The Holocaust by Bullets: Uncovering the Reality of Genocide."

  The event was sponsored by the French Mission to the UN; the short but moving films were on Holocaust killings of Jews in Ukraine and of Roma.

  After the first film, UN official Gillian Kitley told the snow-limited audience that the UN's now combined Office on Genocide Prevention and the Responsibility to Protect advises Secretary General Ban Ki-moon of development in which mass killing may become possible.

  Inner City Press asked Ms. Kitley, what happened with Sri Lanka in 2008 and 2009, when the UN pulled its workers out of northern Sri Lanka, then concealed and denied casualty figures -- Inner City Press got and published a leaked OCHA count of over 2000 civilians killed in a short period -- and then didn't even call for a ceasefire.

  Ms. Kitley replied, "I understand there's been a very thorough investigation" into the UN's actions and inaction in Sri Lanka during that period, and that she'd be very interested to see it. But what about the public, to try to ensure that the UN does a better job in future cases?

  Inner City Press asked Ms. Kitley to have her Office and Adama Dieng, the Under Secretary General for Genocide Prevention (USG for R2P Ed Luck appears to have rather quietly left for an academic job in San Diego) inquire and urge Ban Ki-moon to make the so-called Petrie report on the UN in Sri Lanka public.

  Ms. Kitley did not answer the plea, and the event moved on. Video here, from Minute 1:03:11.

  Alongside the Holocaust, Rwanda in 1994 was repeatedly mentioned (though France's role in supporting the genocidal government, including in the Security Council where current UN Peacekeeping chief Herve Ladsous was then France's Deputy Permanant Representative) -- and Syria was mentioned, by Ms. Kitley.

  Earlier on Wednesday Inner City Press was told by a Sri Lankan diplomat that its close coverage, for example of its recent Universal Periodic Review (#UPRLKA) is not fair, in that it took the richer UK 30 years to deal with its "Irish troubles." We report this in fairness; duly noted. But it is also worth comparing responses to events in Syria and Sri Lanka. We'll have more on this.

November 5, 2012

On Somalia, With EU & US "Too Cheap" for Naval Component, Amendments?

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, November 1 -- At the UN on Somalia, it's war. Not on Al Shabaab, but about the Kenyan naval component of the AMISOM mission.

  In the UN Security Council, African sources in and beyond the Council say, European members and now the United States are "too cheap" to pay for the Kenyan naval assets they "used" to take and hold Kismayo.

  The AMISOM mandate was set to expire on October 31. In a rare session outside of Security Council chambers, with a short text "put in blue" by UN staff working from their homes, the Council agreed to roll over the mandate for a mere seven days.  Click here for Inner City Press in-person coveage of that meeting and vote.

  But, sources say, there is a move to put a longer resolution into blue -- without including the "naval component" of AMISOM.

  The non-Europeans are incensed; there is talk of amendments "from the floor of the Council" to put the naval issue forward.

  This follow-the-money issue is alongside another, about an exemption to allow the sale of charcoal built up in Kismayo. But to reduce this story to "paternalist" EU and US only caring about the welfare of Somalia -- can they buy weapons, can they sell charcoal -- would be misleading.

   As several African diplomats put it to Inner City Press on Thursday, "the Europeans are just cheap." Watch this site.

October 29, 2012

As UNSC Speaks on Ceasefire But Not Terrorism, Al Qaeda OK in Some Places?

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, October 24 -- After envoy Lakhdar Brahimi told the UN Security Council by video to await an official Eid ceasefire response from the Syrian government tomorrow, the Council agreed on a press statement directed particularly at the government, as the stronger party.

  After the statement was read out, Russian Ambassador Vitaly Churkin was asked of the reported rejection in advance of the ceasefire by the Al Nusra Front, which claimed credit for deadly bombings in, among other places, Aleppo in an attack the Council condemned in a statement.

  Churkin said those with influence should speak with such groups. Inner City Press asked Churkin about his other draft Council statement on "Terrorism in Damascus," which the Council did not agree to.

  Churkin said there is a trend of not denouncing some acts of terrorism. He said some find attacks by Al Qaeda OK in some places but not in others: there is, "say that Al Qaeda cannot do certain things in one place but is welcome to do them in another place."

  Minutes later, Syria's Permanent Representative Bashar Ja'afari told the press, "There will be an official statement tomorrow" - that is, the day before the Eid holiday begins. Watch this site.

Footnote: Inner City Press exclusively reported on and put online a list Syrian Mission filed with the Security Council of 108 "foreign nationals" arrested in Syria. Click here for that.
 
  Wednesday the Mission said nothing had been done on the list; it filed a letter about the killing of some 25 civilians in Douma, in an area it says there is no government army presence. Don't expect a press statement any time soon.

On Sri Lanka, Heyns on 40,000 Dead and Video Half-Shown in UN, UPR

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, October 25 -- The UN system's Special Rapporteur on Extrajudicial, Summary and Arbitrary Executions has inevitably dealt with Sri Lanka for some years, given the mandate.

  Inner City Press on October 25 asked Christof Heyns what he has done, to follow up on his predecessor Philip Alston's work on video footage of executions, and otherwise. Video here, from Minute 32:25.

Alston deemed the executions video authentic, in a session in the UN's Dag Hammarskjold Auditorium. Heyns on Thursday told Inner City Press that he followed up on new video which came out after he took up the mandate in 2010, and subsequently appeared "in the Channel 4 documentary."

  That was never shown in the UN's Dag Hammarskjold Auditorium, while the government's purported rebuttal to it was.

Heyns said, "in the meantime as you know the Secretary General's panel reported that up to 40,000 people were killed in the last days of the war." This is a figure that whenever used, push-back and vitriol results. But that's what Heyns said. Video here, from Minute 37:45.

While there is a so-called Universal Periodic Review coming up at the Human Rights Council in Geneva with a mere 72 seconds per speaker, Heyns looked forward to "next March, 2013" when the "High Commissioner needs to report back. The issue is again on the table."

  Heyns said that this year's HRC resolution "requests Sri Lanka to engage with special procedures on a road map dealing with reconciliation and dealing with the past."

  Earlier on October 25 Inner City Press asked the Special Rapporteur on Freedom of Religion or Belief Heiner Bielefeldt about Sri Lanka. He said there are "religious elements" to conflicts and spoke of "national mythologies," seeing "the Other as acting in the interest of a colonial power." He said the UN should "have witnesses planted in those areas." He mentioned the UPR, without mentioning it's only 72 seconds per speaker. Video here, from Minute 32:54.

While it may be unlikely that Bielefeldt will visit Sri Lanka, Heyns said "I am willing to go, the same applies to other mandates as well." He said "the reconsideration next March is important." He called Sri Lanka's "one of the largest reported killings in the world in recent times" that has yet to be "sufficiently dealt with."

  But with Ban Ki-moon's view of accountability, as not requiring punishment of anyone, what will the UN do? For now, it looks like the report prepared by Charles Petrie as he set sail to Myanmar will be buried. Watch this site.

October 22, 2012

Defending Drones at UN, Koh Says Transparency Is Aided by US on HRC, 2d Term Promises

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, October 19 -- When Harold Koh came to the UN on Friday to pitch the US' candidacy for a second term on the Human Rights Council, his opening statement did not mention an issue with which he has become associated: drones.

  Nor did the moderator's question to him -- Koh was asked what the US would do on its HRC campaign pledge about torture. While important, this seemed a softball focused on the previous Bush administration. (An ACLU question extended it to what the Obama administration will do to hold accountable those who tortured in the past.)

  There were only ten minutes left when Inner City Press was able to ask Koh to "address drones, on which there's been controversy at the Human Rights Council and elsewhere, whether their use complies with human rights law. Would the US support a special session or inquiry into the use of drones to commit executions?"

  When it was Koh's turn to answer -- he was moved up in the queue -- he cited to his own speech "in March 2010, echoed by John Brennan at the Wilson Center....The point is, all killing is regrettable [but] not all killing is illegal."

  He said that killings by drone "in the course of armed conflict or in self defense is consistent with international law." He cited Al Qaeda, the Taliban and "associated forces" -- presumably including Al Shabab in Somalia and forces in norther Mali or Azawad -- and said it is "not illegal to target an individual who is leader of an opposing force."

  What about a 16-year old who is not a leader? What about "collateral damage"?

  These weren't answered. Rather, Koh said he thought he questions were "ask[ed] in friendly way." He closed with the pitch that it would easier to work on the issue and get "transparency" if the US remains on the Human Rights Council. And then he left.

  Inner City Press had also asked, "if the others running [for the Human Rights Council had] a interest in having drones addressed at the Council, the use of drones in Pakistan, Yemen and other countries."

  But the other candidates present did not address this in their answers after the question. Germany's Permanent Representative Peter Wittig answered a question about vote-trading by saying that Permanent members of the Security Council don't have to engage in it, but others do. Estonia and Montenegro addressed this and other points, but not drones.

  Argentina acknowledged that the Latin slate is "clean" -- three candidates for three seats -- just as it ran unopposed the day before for a two-year seat on the Security Council.

  Ireland's closing statement concerned the "style" it brings; the moderator's Irish question about about food security." Sweden focused on Internet freedom -- the country hosts, for example, sites that Russia argues are subject to UN Security Council sanctions.

  Greece spoke about the difficulty of being besieged by immigrants. There were echoes of the previous Romney - Obama debate, to which Koh jokingly referred. But drones are no joke. Watch this site.

October 15, 2012

On Sri Lanka, UN's 4 Month Report Not Done in Year, Petrie on to Myanmar

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, October 12 -- The UN's acts and omissions during the killing of thousands of civilians in Sri Lanka in 2009 has given rise to criticism, to which Secretary General Ban Ki-moon responded in September 2011 by saying UN official Thoraya Obaid would investigate and issue a report in four months time.

  Nine months later, no report was issued and Inner City Press asked why not. Ban's spokesman Martin Nesirky said for the first time that Obaid had not been able to do the report, but that Charles Petrie was not on the case and would issue a report shortly.

  That hasn't happened either, and Inner City Press has since learned that Petrie has another job, with the Norway government funded Myanmar Peace Support Initiative (MPSI), which is also controversial.

  But it's made Inner City Press wonder: how can Petrie do two jobs at once? How he work for the UN and, essentially, for the Norwegian government at the same time, in seeming violation of Article 100 of the UN Charter? And where is the report on the UN in Sri Lanka?

  On October 11, Inner City Press asked Nesirky:

Inner City Press: I had asked about this report that was supposed to be now done by Charles Petrie into the UN’s performance in Sri Lanka in 2009. And I went back and looked at it. It seemed like it was supposed to be finished in August and you had said that when it is finished it will be up to the Secretary-General whether to make it public or not. One, so I want to know the status now that we are in October. But also, I didn’t know this, but Mr. Petrie has another job, which is to be the head of the Myanmar peace support initiative, Norwegian. Did he do this at the same time? Was this a full-time position? Has he finished the report and what is going to happen with the report?

Spokesperson Nesirky: The work with that Norwegian organization has absolutely nothing to do with the United Nations. It is the work that is being carried out on the report and continues to be carried out is obviously entirely separate and is not a full-time role. So I think that covers that. The first part of your question, yes, it is still in the works, and when it is ready, it will be ready, but it is still in the works.

Inner City Press: Okay. So it hasn’t been finished and given to the Secretary-General?

Spokesperson Nesirky: Not yet. It has not been given to the Secretary-General at this point, yeah.

  If the long delayed report has not been given to Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, then mustn't it still be with Charles Petrie? But where IS Charles Petrie? He is being quoted at the director of the Myanmar Peace Support Initiative (MPSI).

  On October 12, Inner City Press asked Nesirky again: what is the UN's view of the Myanmar Peace Support Initiative, and how can Petrie work there and for the UN at the same time?

  Nesirky said he has answered the question yesterday -- see transcript above -- so Inner City Press followed up and asked what is Petrie's status with the UN, and about Article 100 of the UN Charter, essentially requiring serving only one master.

  Nesirky insisted he had answer the question, and that if he has anything more he will provide it. We'll see. Watch this site.

October 8, 2012

As France Spins 2-Step on Mali, ECOWAS Frustration, What of Algeria and Chad?

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, October 4 -- When Thursday's Mali consultations of the UN Security Council broken up near 5 pm, French Ambassador Gerard Araud emerged and confirmed that France would circulate a draft resolution shortly (in a day or two) but NOT yet to deploy ECOWAS forces.

  Why the delay? Araud twice said, we've been waiting for some time for details from ECOWAS. He said the resolution might specify, deliver the delays in 30 days or as soon as possible.

  Inner City Press asked Araud, what about Mali neighbors which are not members of ECOWAS, like Mauritania and Algeria?

  Araud replied that any and all countries are invited to be involved. He mentioned the European Union, then circled back to Chad.

  But again, what about Algeria? The country has long opposed interventions, especially involving former colonialism France. While pretending not to take the lead or play any special role on Mali, it was Araud who came to the stakeout; it is France which is drafting.

Then again, MUJAO in Northern Mali last month executed an Algerian diplomat. Araud said that there is unanimity in the Council on Mali, and afterward Cote d'Ivoire Ambassador Bamba, who was not allowed in the meeting, emphasized to the press that at the Sahel meeting at the UN during General Debate week, there was a strong political demand a resolution authorizing force.

But what about the neighbors, which are not members of ECOWAS? Watch this site.

October 1, 2012

At UNGA's Surreal Stakeout, Swiss Small 5 Lost in Translation, Morocco Runs

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, September 25 -- Even penned in cavernous Conference Room 1 during a badly administered first day of the UN General Debate, opportunities that seem potentially newsworthy crop up unexpected.

  Between scheduled "media availability" stakeouts by Julia Gillard of Australia and Guatemala's president, Switzerland's president Eveline Widmer-Schlumpf appeared on UN Television speaking at the stakeout microphone.

  After first her answers were in German. But then an Australian journalist asked if Europeans would vote, in the current Security Council seat race, for Luxembourg and Finland rather than Australia.

  She declined this question, but half-answered the next one, about Obama or Romney. She said they would be the same on banks, that she has a preference but will not say it.

  As she responded to a question about sanctions on Iran, Inner City Press ran from the Media Center along a corridor of blue painted barricades to the stakeout and asked a Swiss question: does the "Small Five" effort to reform the Security Council's working methods survive its withdrawal earlier this year?

To be diplomatic, it seems the question was misheard. She answered "2022," apparently that Switzerland is running for a Security Council seat in a decade's time. She called it a "one year term," when the terms are for two years.

Afterward a spokesman told Inner City Press, "you can't use that." If agreed in advance, Inner City Press always respects that.

  But in this case, the comments were already broadcast on UN Television. And this comes shortly after hoopla about Switzerland's ten years in the UN -- click here for decade's review by Inner City Press. For the record, Inner City Press has had praise for the Swiss Mission to the UN and related community. But answers to questions on UN TV are for use.

  Minutes later the foreign minister of Morocco Saad-Eddine El Othmani appeared. Inner City Press has previously filmed Q&A with him, and this time ran to the stakeout as for Switzerland's president.

 But this time a signal was given and the media availability abruptly called to a close. There are questions. Hey, it might have been a softball about Morocco's position on a UN envoy for the Sahel. Maybe --watch this site.

* * *

As Wittig Takes Abyei Question Ladsous Refused, DPKO Tries Edit UNTV

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, September 28 -- The dispute between Sudan and South Sudan about Abyei has been the subject of UN talk and spending at least since the time of the defunct Peacekeeping mission UNMIS.

   But on September 27, when Inner City Press asked "on Abyei, what is the UN's role?" the chief of the UN Department of Peacekeeping Operations Herve Ladsous refused to answer.

   On September 28, after belatedly obtaining a response to the same question from outgoing Security Council president Peter Wittig, Inner City Press learned that Ladsous' DPKO had hit a new low.

   DPKO asked to get even Inner City Press' question about Abyei removed from the UN webcast archived video.  That is the strategy: to censor or modify the UN's video production to make it appear that no question was even asked. A new low.

   But here, even if this new low for the UN is achieved by Ladsous and (at least) three spokespeople he has debased is successful, is YouTube video of that Abyei question stakeout. Video here.

  And German Ambassador Wittig, while seeking to focus on the congratulatory aspect of the UNSC Press Statement he read out, said that the Security Council will meet again about Sudan and South Sudan, and Abyei, and get a briefing from envoy Haile Menkerios. Apparently, the bi-weekly meetings on the Sudans will continue.

  But what of Ladsous and his refusal to answer Press questions about his job, and then attempts to get even the questions censored or edited out of the UN's webcast video? Who is hurting the UN's credibility?

  On Thursday evening, Ladsous' spokeswoman told the UNTV boom microphone operator not to give the mic to Inner City Press, and tried to convince the two other correspondents present to ask questions. But there were no other questions. Ladsous walked away from the microphone as Inner City Press asked the Abyei question. Now DPKO has asked to have the question edited out.

  Ladsous is hitting a new low. Beginning in late May, after Inner City Press ran an exclusive article about Ladsous' proposal behind closed doors that DPKO use drones, Ladsous had refused to answer any Inner City Press questions, no matter how simple.

Inner City Press asked Ladsous why his Department flew Congolese military officials to a meeting to recruit the Mai Mai militia to fight another group, the M23. Ladsous refused to answer.

But on Sudan and South Sudan, on which the member states which pay Ladsous' tax-free salary have spent billions, after millions of people have been killed, Ladsous' refusal to answer the basic question -- "on Abyei, what is the UN's role?" -- is particularly troubling.

By contrast, at the very same stakeout area earlier on the same day, Inner City Press questions were taken and answered by the foreign ministers of Jordan and Italy, Australia and the Netherlands. But Ladsous, ostensibly an international public servant, won't answer.

  A fish rots from the head, as the old saw goes. And this old saw, more than one diplomat has said, should go. Watch this site.

September 24, 2012 -- for UNGA week coverage, click here.

As Ban Ki-moon Meets UAE & Arab League, Roed-Larsen at Both, Ladsous UAE

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, September 21 -- As this Fall's UN General Assembly begins, Secretary General Ban Ki-moon and different members of his team met back to back Friday with the United Arab Emirates' foreign minister Sheikh Abdullah Bin Zayed Al Nahyan then with an Arab League delegation led by Nabil Elaraby.

  Inner City Press covered both as photo-ops, being confined between the two in a holding room with an Egyptian videographer in the office of Deputy Secretary General Jan Eliasson. Questions arose about Ban's different line-ups for the two meetings.

  Ban's uncommunicative top Peacekeeper Herve Ladsous, the fourth Frenchman in a row to hold the post, attended the meeting with the UAE but not with the Arab League.

  Since the UAE is hardly big in UN Peacekeeping, one thought the rationale would be to talk about Syria. But Ladsous was absent from the more Syria-focused Arab League meeting.

   Terje Roed-Larsen, whose mandate under Security Council resolution 1559 Syria has repeatedly sought to reign in, was present for both meetings.

  Ban's top lawyer Patricia O'Brien, also uncommunicative in that she has repeatedly refused requests to do a press conference or take questions, arrived for the Arab League meeting, of which Inner City Press made a 3-minute video, on YouTube here.

  The head of the UN Department of Political Affairs, former US State Department official Jeffrey Feltman, was understandably present for both meetings. The UAE foreign minister called out to him, "Jeff, I just sent you a text message," which Feltman acknowledged receiving. For Iran - LOL?

  Here was Ban's spokesperson's office's read-out of the UAE meeting:

"They discussed several regional issues including Syria, and the Middle East Peace Process. The Secretary-General thanked Sheikh Abdullah for hosting the UN presence in the UAE and welcomed the newly established UNOCHA Gulf Office. He also noted the important role the UAE is playing in humanitarian financing through its Office for the Coordination of Foreign Aid."

So that's why the UN's top humanitarian Valerie Amos was there. But why was Ladsous at the UAE meeting? Watch this site.

Update of 6:36 pm -- the UN spokesperson has put out this read out of the Arab League meeting:

They discussed first and foremost the situation in Syria, with its political impasse, widespread human rights abuses, and growing humanitarian crisis.

They expressed serious concern about the question of Palestine, the lack of progress in peace negotiations, and the alarming economic situation as well as the absence of hope in the occupied Palestinian territory.

Finally, they discussed the rioting that recently erupted following the posting of the irresponsible and provocative video on the Prophet Mohammed, which they condemned, while deploring the violence that ensued.

But what about France Banning even peaceful protests? Click here for that.

September 17, 2012

After Benghazi Killings, US Proposed Criticizing Denigration of Religion, France Said No: Likes Denigrating

By Matthew Russell Lee, Exclusive

UNITED NATIONS, September 14, updated below -- Two days after the UN Security Council issued a press statement on the "Attacks against U.S. Diplomatic Personnel" in Libya, Inner City Press has learned of a telling back-and-forth in the Council prior to adoption of the statement.

   The US Mission to the UN proposed the initial draft, which included a phrase against the denigration of religion, Inner City Press has exclusively been informed, then France opposed inclusion of that phrase, arguing among other things that the French constitution is secular.

  While this action too will have its reaction -- three Council members paraphrased French Permanent Representative Gerard Araud that he likes and takes pride in the freedom to denigrate religion, and two called this outrageous -- the Council Press Statement was issued on September 12 without anything on denigration of religion.

   It is newsworthy, Council members emphasize to Inner City Press, both that this US Mission to the UN proposed the phrase criticizing denigration of religion, and that France -- where the Sarkozy-era spats about religious jewelry and even halal butchers are apparently not over -- opposed it.

   "There are other statements coming," a Security Council member told Inner City Press at 4 pm on Friday. Watch this site.

Update of 7 pm -- Council members tell Inner City Press there IS another press statement under the silence procedure, about the attacks on embassies in Sudan.

  Meanwhile the US had Vice President Biden call Sudanese Vice President Taha. President Omar al-Bashir, of course, has been indicted by the International Criminal Court for genocide. But that didn't stop Ban Ki-moon from greeting, if not meeting, Bashir. Priorities...

As 3 More Afghan Audits Leak, UNAMA Deputy Says UN Should Disclose Risk

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, September 14 -- Exposing a series of audits of the Law & Order Trust Fund for Afghanistan over the past 11 weeks, Inner City Press has received a few responses from the UN Development Program but no direct comment on the exclusively published leaked audits.

  On Friday, Inner City Press asked the UN's Afghanistan deputy Michael Keating about them. Video here, from Minute 11:07.

   Keating said "we need to be more explicit in acknowledging... the risks that are inevitably there with a program of this size and complexity and not try to hide those risks."

   But as donors threaten to stop funding LOTFA, a question is whether disclosing the risks would be enough, or whether some of the corruption like double payments and "missing assets" would have to curtailed.

   Today Inner City Press exclusively publishes three more audits. In "Observation 19," the auditors drily note:

"During the course of our physical verification of assets, we noted that some of the assets, which were appearing in Statement of Assets, were not physically present."

  This diplomatic "not physically present" phrase, if accepted, would have a good future on all manner of criminal defense.

In Observation 18, the auditors state that "during the course of our audit we noted certain instances where purchase orders were not raised in respect of procurement of goods," including over $300,000 for the purchase of Toyota vehicles.

   Observation 17 "note[s] instances where evidences of required approvals by Special Procurement Commission were not available with the contracts" and "recommends that the provisions of the Afghanistan Procurement Law should be complied" with. Ya don't say.

  Beyond this UN system corruption, there is a more serious debate about the proposed spending on constructing a new electoral roll -- would it be done fairly for all groups and how much would it cost.

  But with this clear example of UN corruption not yet addressed, and with UNDP declining to directly address the audits, the questioning of the UN's role(s) in Afghanistan inevitably takes place in the aura of these, shall we say, irregularities.

  Inner City Press had been informed by sources in Afghanistan that Keating, after working for the Africa Progress Panel with Robert Rubin, among others, on its board, got the post with the support of Tony Blair (Blair also works for JP Morgan Chase and ostensibly for the UN on Palestine) --  and that he is now leaving the Afghanistan Deputy post. So Inner City Press asked. Video here, from minute 17:22.

  Keating confirmed that he is leaving, saying it is after two years in the post, calling leaving "absolutely normal." Watch this site.

September 10, 2012

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, September 5 -- UNICEF on August 31 and September 2 offered Syria casualty figures -- 1600 killed in a week -- that it refused to explain, but which went out all over the world.

  The figures were in fact derived, Inner City Press persisted and on September 3 learned, from the media itself.

 At UN headquarters on September 5, Inner City Press asked Secretary General Ban Ki-moon's spokesman Martin Nesirky about it:

  To some, even inside UNICEF, it also seems important that the numbers announced by the UN be credible, or at least that their sourcing be disclosed as the same time they are announced. The worst is the mis-direction in which UNICEF engaged, saying "call OCHA" when they weren't OCHA's numbers at all.

  After UNICEF's Patrick McCormick was quoted that "at least 1,600 people were killed in Syria last week" and Reuters said he was "citing a U.N. document," Inner City Press early on September 2 asked McCormick, which document? And how was the data collected?

   McCormick replied to Inner City Press, "call OCHA" -- the UN's Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs.

  This seemed strange anyway: in 2009 OCHA refused to release very specific casualty figures -- 2,683 --  it had collected in Sri Lanka.

  At the time, the UN told Inner City Press it is not in the business of counting the dead -- Inner City Press thought and thinks the UN should at least do this, where it can. But in a credible and transparent way.

  In this case, Inner City Press' initial questioning was picked up by the UK Guardian, as was the above-quoted OCHA response. 

Still UNICEF's number continues to proliferate. Voice of America at 2 pm on September 2 dutifully quoted McCormick on the numbers for UNICEF, headed by Anthony Lake. Click here for Washington Post; UNICEF's one-week 1600 death count has since been in, among others, Canada's big newspapers, GlobalPost, IBT, Slate, the Huffington Post, the Daily Beast - and in the UN's host city, New York Post and New York Daily News.

  Since then, the Jamaica Observer, VOA-affiliated Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty, San Francisco Chronicle, Pittsburgh Post Gazette, Detroit Free Press, South China Morning Post, and more.

 More doubts should have been raised: in Syria in 2012, the UN's mission has left after UN Peacekeeping chief Herve Ladsous said that even observers in armored cars can't get around. How would OCHA have collected figures of the type it refused to release in Sri Lanka in 2009, and why would it (well, UNICEF) release them about Syria in 2012?

  Despite OCHA's belated response to Inner City Press after UNICEF's, in context, deception play, will this be like the Inner City Press exposed but never corrected claim that new UN envoy Lakhdar Brahimi is a "Nobel Peace laureate"? Click here for that. And watch this site.

As Feltman Jogs Into US Mission, Need for UN FOIA, & Schedules Online

By Matthew Russell Lee, View

UNITED NATIONS, September 5 -- The UN claims to be transparent, but it has no Freedom of Information law. So its steps toward transparency are small and random.

  Secretary General Ban Ki-moon has a "public" schedule, but for example his recent encounter with Sudan's Omar al Bashir, indicted by the International Criminal Court for genocide, was not disclosed.

 When Inner City Press asked about it, it was called a mere handshake. But Sudan issued a read-out of four issues covered.

  Ban's new Deputy Secretary General Jan Eliasson also has a public online schedule. But recently Inner City Press was told that a visiting foreign minister had met with Eliasson -- and it never appeared on his schedule.

  Wednesday morning Inner City Press happened to see Ban's new chief of the Department of Political Affairs, Jeffrey Feltman, jogging into the US Mission to the UN on 45th Street. It seemed noteworthy, since most missions come to meet Feltman in his UN office.

  When Inner City Press asked, it was informally told that Feltman goes out to meet with other missions beyond the US, his native country whose State Department he served until earlier this year. Inner City Press asked, which ones? But that, seemingly as a matter of policy, is not public.

  Under Eliasson, the UN DSG position has a political component, which Inner City Press compared to that of Feltman. Why does one make his schedule public, and the other not? Why isn't the schedule of top UN Peacekeeping Herve Ladsous, resistant to Press questions, put online?

  Both Under Secretaries General, we have noted, made themselves present at a sculpture exhibition opening Tuesday night at the UN, along with Ban Ki-moon and ambassadors including that of North Korea.

  Ban, Feltman, Ladsous and other USGs will retreat to Torino this weekend. Increased transparency should be in their agenda.

  Inner City Press asked on Wednesday, why doesn't Feltman put his schedule online, at least as DSG Eliasson does? We need to keep some secrets was the affable but unsatisfactory answer. Secrets on behalf of whom?

  It is time for a UN Freedom of Information Act, which Inner City Press has long asked for. In the interim, Feltman should consider putting his schedule online. Watch this site.

September 3, 2012

On Syria, UNICEF's 1600 Death Count Came From Media, Not OCHA

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, September 3 -- On Syria, the UN announces to the media death figures which are derived, Inner City Press has learned, from the media itself.

  Then these are circularly sourced to "UN documents" and given more weight than they should be.

  UNICEF on August 31 and September 2 offered Syria casualty figures it refused to explain, but which went out all over the world.

  After UNICEF's Patrick McCormick was quoted that "at least 1,600 people were killed in Syria last week" and Reuters said he was "citing a U.N. document," Inner City Press early on September 2 asked McCormick, which document? And how was the data collected?

   McCormick replied to Inner City Press, "call OCHA" -- the UN's Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs.

  After three separate inquiries with OCHA, and McCormick refusing to respond to follow-up questions, Inner City Press has just been informed by OCHA's spokesman in Geneva that

"The estimated figure of 1,600 persons was arrived at from UNICEF's own internal monitoring of different media sources. The figure does not come from OCHA."

   The key phrase here is "media sources" -- UNICEF took the number from news reports, despite the adjective "different" and the reference to "internal monitoring OF media sources." Essentially, UNICEF reads reports on the Internet.

   But where do these news reports come from?

  Increasingly, Western wire services take their casualty figures from "non-governmental organizations" or, more accurately, "activists."  Sometimes, at least, the sourcing is disclosed as such.
  
    But by laundering the activists figures through the UN system, as UNICEF has done, the figures take on the veneer of objectivity.

   Reuters' report said that McCormick has "citing a UN document."

   Inner City Press repeatedly checked, and fourd on OCHA's ReliefWeb site a UNICEF report stating that "a record death toll of 1,600 persons was reported." So it appeared even then that UNICEF's McCormick was quoting a UNICEF report.

  But, tellingly, UNICEF's spokesman McCormick could or would not explain UNICEF's own numbers. Why else pass the buck to OCHA?

  This seemed strange anyway: in 2009 OCHA refused to release very specific casualty figures -- 2,683 --  it had collected in Sri Lanka.

  At the time, the UN told Inner City Press it is not in the business of counting the dead -- Inner City Press thought and thinks the UN should at least do this, where it can. But in a credible and transparent way.

  Inner City Press immediately on September 2 did try to contact OCHA. But OCHA's lead spokesperson is away, as was one of the two referred-to replacements. The other did not initially respond. Nor did McCormick, to follow-ups.

Inner City Press asked OCHA:

Hi, I'm sorry to bother you on a Sunday, but when I asked UNICEF for the source of its figure of 1,600 killed last week in Syria, I was told to "call OCHA." I checked ReliefWeb and found a UNICEF report where it's stated "A record death toll of 1,600 persons was reported."

Press question on deadline, I'm sorry to say, since this figure is going out all over the world: reported by whom? Where do the figures come from? Does the figure cited include military deaths? Deaths among armed groups?

Seems important to answer this, especially since the UN system in other contexts has said it does not have access (in Syria at least since UNSMIS left) and / or does not count the dead (I was told this regarding Sri Lanka in 2009 -- I thought and think that UN should at least do this, where it can. But in a credible and transparent way.

Does OCHA has casualty figures beyond the above-quoted (but unsourced) UNICEF report?

The next day, OCHA replied:

Subject: Re: I was told to "call OCHA" about UNICEF's statement of 1,600 killed in Syria last week: reported by whom? Thanks
From: Jens Laerke [at] un.org
To: Matthew Russell Lee [at] InnerCityPress.com
Date: Mon, Sep 3, 2012 at 4:48 AM

Dear Matthew

At a media briefing in Geneva last Friday, a UNICEF spokesperson gave an estimated figure for the number of deaths in Syria over the previous week.

The estimated figure of 1,600 persons was arrived at from UNICEF's own internal monitoring of different media sources.

The figure does not come from OCHA.

Hope this helps, Best regards

Jens Laerke, Spokesperson & Public Information Officer OCHA Geneva

  Inner City Press' initial questioning was picked up by the UK Guardian, as was the above-quoted OCHA response.

  Still UNICEF's number continues to proliferate. Voice of America at 2 pm on September 2 dutifully quoted McCormick on the numbers for UNICEF, headed by Anthony Lake. Click here for Washington Post; UNICEF's one-week 1600 death count has since been in, among others, Canada's big newspapers, GlobalPost, IBT, Slate, the Huffington Post, the Daily Beast - and in the UN's host city, New York Post and New York Daily News.

 Since then, the Jamaica Observer, VOA-affiliated Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty, San Francisco Chronicle, Pittsburgh Post Gazette, Detroit Free Press, South China Morning Post, and more.

 More doubts should have been raised: in Syria in 2012, the UN's mission has left after UN Peacekeeping chief Herve Ladsous said that even observers in armored cars can't get around. How would OCHA have collected figures of the type it refused to release in Sri Lanka in 2009, and why would it (well, UNICEF) release them about Syria in 2012?

  Despite OCHA's belated response to Inner City Press after UNICEF's, in context, deception play, will this be like the Inner City Press exposed but never corrected claim that new UN envoy Lakhdar Brahimi is a "Nobel Peace laureate"? Click here for that. And watch this site.

Rwanda's Mushikiwabo Says UN Looks for Excuses, Hege is Ideologically Bankrupt

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, August 29 -- The day after a Rwandan delegation sharply criticized the UN's Democratic Republic of the Congo sanctions Group of Experts and its coordinator Steve Hege, Rwanda's Foreign Minister Louise Mushikiwabo said that Hege and his report are "ideologically bankrupt." Video here.

  Inner City Press asked Minister Mushikiwabo four questions after her closed door meeting interacting with the UN Security Council.

  While she did not answer if the Rwandan government believes that Hege (and his Group of Experts colleague Marie Plamadiala from Moldova) met with Jean Marie Micombero, she called Hege's "ideological leanings troubling."

   She said, "for anybody who is sympathetic to the genocidal militia FDLR, which is proven through his writings, to be the man who is at the head of this Group of Experts is just an aberration... We have signaled our concern to the appointing authorities and we will wait to see what the reaction is. But I will find it deeply troubling that the Security Council could not look into how this man was appointed"

   Hege spoke to the DRC Sanctions Committee on August 28. Inner City Press previously first pointed to two articles he published in 2009 about the FDLR -- one was taken down quickly off Scribd after Inner City Press linked to it. We continue to await an explanation of this. The UN told Inner City Press it vetted Hege.

  Last time she was at the UN, Mushikiwabo was critical of the performance of the UN mission in the Congo, MONUSCO. On August 29, Inner City Press asked her specifically about MONUSCO chief Roger Meece, and the Mission's admitted flying of Congolese officials to try to recruit Mai Mai militia to fight the M23.

  Mushikiwabo said that, while failing in their missions, MONUSCO and some in the Congolese army FARDC are looking to "find excuses."

  She said much the same when Inner City Press asked how the M23 rebellion should be addressed, saying solutions should come from within the DRC, not by blaming the neighbors.

   Inner City Press asked of media reports that the SADC has offered to send troops along the DRC - Rwanda border. Mushikiwabo said she is not aware of such an offer, but rather since four SADC members are also members of the Great Lakes groups ICGGLR, then SADC -- of which the Congo is a member -- could offers support and advice.

  On August 28, it was Patrick Karuretwa, Defense & Security Adviser to Rwandan President Paul Kagame, who told Inner City Press regarding Hege that "a line that has been crossed by the coordinator of the Group of Experts. We expect any member to have views, baggage, but here a line has been crossed. You [pointed to] two of his articles.... in one of them he said the international community is souring on Rwanda. We say he's been given the tools to do precisely that."

   There are other questions for Hege, ranging for alleged radio intercepts to claiming the presence of one Jack (or "Jacques") Nziza on the Congolese border when Rwanda says there are more than 100 alibi witnesses, including diplomats.

 We'll have more on this.  Inner City Press believes there is a need for more accountability at the UN, including of sanctions "experts." Watch this site.

August 27, 2012

On Eve of Return to NY at 81, Brahimi's Jordan & Anti-Election Links Eyed

By Matthew Russell Lee, 1 in a series

UNITED NATIONS, August 22 -- With Lakhdar Brahimi on his way to the UN in New York, already some bad-mouthing of him has started. The opposition's critique is not only of his statement that it's too early for him to say that Assad must go, but is more fundamental.

  "Wasn't he part of annulling the Islamists' electoral victory in Algeria?" one source pointedly asked.

  Another pointed out Brahimi's connection by daughter's marriage high into Jordan's royal family.

   Inner City Press, which has pointed out that contrary to wire and then other reports Brahimi is NOT a "Nobel Peace laureate" was itself corrected, for having said Brahimi is 78.

  "He's 81," a source said, noting that in 2004 Brahimi presented himself in Iran as being 73 years old. Once this is confirmed, as the Nobel Foundation confirmed to Inner City Press that Brahimi is NOT a Nobel Peace laureate, we will have more.

   So why did Brahimi take the job? One source said, "These guys just can't stand to give up power, even if it is only the UN kind of power."

  It was predicted Brahimi will try for a smaller team than Annan, perhaps keeping on Ahmad Fawzi and trying to place three or four people in Damascus. That, like after his meeting with Francois Hollande, he will now present himself as in the "listening mode."

   And that it is late, too late, for a mediated solution. "This will be decided," a well placed UN source said, "on the ground."

   The problem is that there are many, many armed groups in the opposition, he said. There's an Al Qaeda-like movement; there's the Muslim Brotherhood, supported by Egypt and Qatar. And then there are 200 groups, who control areas here and there and will not bow down to any Syrian outside. So even if a deal is cut, "these guys won't stop."

   "This will be a failure for the UN," the UN source concluded. "It will be seen as weak and ineffectual. Ban Ki-moon is trying to avoid the fall-out by appointing one high profile envoy after another, and letting them take the heat." The source paused and then marveled, "It's actually pretty smart."

  These are some views; there are others. Watch this site.

  After nearly being thrown out of the country by President Joseph Kabila, the price for staying in has been to slavishly support the government and its often undisciplined army, the FARDC.

  As previously noted, DPKO chief Herve Ladsous has said openly, twice on camera, that he will not answer any Inner City Press questions. Video here, at Minute 28:10. And Ladsous spokesman Kieran Dwyer reiterated this in writing, and on camera. Video here, Minute 6:50.

  But this is a question that should be answered: how can the UN be playing a role, even a transportation and facilitation and "security" role, in recruit a militia that the UN itself has been highly critical of?

  In Sudan, the UN provided free helicopter flights to Ahmed Harun, indicted by the International Criminal Court for war crimes, click here for one of Inner City Press' exposes on this.

  This year, Ban Ki-moon and Ladsous accepted as a Senior Adviser on Peacekeeping Operations the Sri Lankan general Shavendra Silva, whose battalion is depicted in Ban's own Panel of Experts report as engaged in war crimes.

  Ladsous specifically refused to answer a question about Silva - this was the first time Ladsous said, "I will not answer questions" from Inner City Press. Video here, at Minute 28:10

  But in the Congo, the UN is going "hands on," flying Congolese officials to meetings with a militia leader who says the meeting was to recruit him and his 4000 fighters to join the bloody fight with the M23? How much lower can DPKO go, under Ladsous? How much more unaccountable can this UN become? Watch this site.

August 20, 2012

Brahimi Is Not a Nobel Laureate, Nobel Foundation Tells ICP, Who Corrects?

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, August 19 -- Two days after Lakhdar Brahimi was named Joint Special Representative on Syria and a wire service called him "a Nobel Peace Laureate," and a day after Inner City Press twice questioned this designation, the Nobel Foundation has told Inner City Press that Brahimi "has not been awarded a Nobel Prize and should therefore not be referred to as a Nobel Laureate."

  The Nobel Foundation's public releations manager Annika Pontikis also said that, until Inner City Press' question, no one had asked her this question.

  So the initial wire story wasn't fact checked -- in fact, that Brahimi is not a Nobel laureate is clear from a simple search of the Nobel web site -- and those who ran it did not check either.

  The "Brahimi as Nobel Peace laureate" phrase continued to proliferate, from Reuters to SABC, Malta Today, Euronews, Ghana Broadcasting Corporation, Eyewitness News, Channel 4

  Nor did any of these respond to inquiries, nor apparently run any correction.

   As Inner City Press has previously asked without answer, how are these things supposed to work?

  There is the media, then there is the source or subject. Should Brahimi, personally involved in his public relations machine, have reached out to correct the inaccurate description of himself receiving a prize he never received?

  Inner City Press before and just after Brahimi took the job wrote that it would be a form of "Nobel Prize lottery" for him - if anything good happens, he might be in line for the Nobel Peace Prize; if not, expectations are low.

  Further lowering expectations, Brahimi did phone interviews: first with French state media France 24, telling them that the UN only cares about helping the Syrian people.

   On August 18 Brahimi called Reuters, which then wrote for yet another time that Brahami is "a Nobel Peace laureate."

  Finally, Inner City Press asked the Nobel Foundation "whether former UN official (and incoming Syria envoy) Lakhdar Brahimi was or is a Nobel Peace laureate" and "if others have asked you this." The reply:

From: Annika Pontikis [at] nobel.se
Date: Sun, Aug 19, 2012 at 1:26 PM
Subject: SV: Is Lakhdar Brahimi a Nobel Peace laureate?
To: Matthew R. Lee [at] InnerCityPress.com

Dear Matthew Lee,

As you probably know the United Nations, as an organization, has been awarded the Nobel Prize. This, however, does not mean that persons affiliated to the UN can call themselves Nobel Laureates.

The person referred to below has not been awarded a Nobel Prize and should therefore not be referred to as a Nobel Laureate.

I have not received this question from others.

Kind regards,

Annika Pontikis

   As Inner City Press wrote before this answer, a "Nobel was given in 1988 to UN Peacekeeping, but if that makes Brahimi a Nobel laureate many others can claim that same prize. So why the designation? We'll wait and see." And now we see. What next? Watch this site.

At UN, Tale of 12 Twitter Feeds, Missions Tweet Stakeouts, Facebook Start-Ups

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, August 15 -- It was by Twitter alone that the French Mission to the UN announced two press stakeouts last Friday by its Permanent Representative to the UN. Not surprisingly, the turnout was low -- in fact, only Inner City Press at the second of the two stakeouts, on Mali.

   So it seems timely, especially in this mid-August lull, to review some UN Mission's twitter accounts, and wonder how long it will be until all 193 UN members -- and Palestine and the Holy See -- establish their twitter feeds.

   Beyond its many spokespeople, the US Mission to the UN maintains @USUN, the most recent tweets of which involve Ambassador Susan Rice's time representing President Barack Obama as the closing of the London Olympics.

  The UK Mission to the UK tweets frequently on @UKUN_NewYork, for example yesterday about Ali Saleh supporters' assault on the Yemeni Defense Ministry, about which the UN at its noon briefing said it was not even aware.

  On the Latin tip, @GuatemalaONU while serving in the Security Council last tweeted about its vote for the Syria resolution in the General Assembly on August 3. This even is its affable expert greeted Inner City Press on her way into the GRULAC Third Committee meeting about the rights of the child.

   The Syria GA vote is @NorwayUN's second most recent tweet, superseded by an announcement of the sheathing of the Empire State Building in Norway's colors for its participation in the Olympics.

  One wondered: couldn't many other countries get that as well? Former Permanent Representative of Norway Morten Wetland, a tweeter himself, has gone back to work at First House, from which one hopes he'll tweet. Robert Mood began but stopped.

   Going Germanic, @GermanyUN's last tweet is about a meeting on, what else, the future of the Euro.

   Targets of Security Council sanctions can have their twitter too, although @EritreaUN's only tweet so far this year involves their cycling team.

   While not a member state, though sometimes said to seek to speak like one, the @EUatUN has announced it is moving this month from its offices on 41st Street -- but the new address, on Third Avenue, didn't fit in the tweet, ran over its the EU's page on Facebook. (Inner City Press, with voluteer help, is just starting Beta dabbling in Facebook, here: http://www.facebook.com/innercitypress

  Poland's @PLinUN covered Beyonce in the GA, as did Inner City Press. @SwedenUN did indigenous. @PalauUN promises sub-tweets, with Ambassador Stuart J. Beck notated as SJB.

  South Africa's @SAMissionNY hasn't tweeted since February, but when it did it was about Palestine.

  Italy's @ItMissionUNNY does a lot of re-tweeting, but had an exclusive last month about Deputy Secretary General Jan Eliasson at the UN Staff College in Turin.

Secretary General Ban Ki-moon himself is often (mis) represented by @secgen, which merely takes his daily public schedule and puts it online, even if the events are canceled or don't fit into 140 characters. And so it goes, with the UN and social media.

  We will have more on this. Watch this site - and pitch us your feeds!

August 13, 2012

On Syria, ICP Puts Ban's Letter Online, No Answer on Brahimi & Feltman

By Matthew Russell Lee, Exclusive

UNITED NATIONS, August 10 -- More than a week after the Syria report of top UN Peacekeeper Herve Ladsous, who seems to have gone missing, Secretary General Ban Ki-moon on August 10 turned in a bilingual update to the UN Security Council. Inner City Press is putting it online before 10 pm, here.

  Meanwhile amid reports that long time UN official Lakhdar Brahimi is to be named to replace Kofi Annan as envoy to Syria, Inner City Press at 11 am Friday witnessed the entry of Syrian Permanent Representative to the UN Bashar Ja'afari to meet with UN political chief Jeffrey Feltman. A well placed source exclusive told Inner City Press: Brahimi will be discussed.

  And so at Friday UN noon briefing Inner City Press asked Ban's deputy spokesman Eduardo Del Buey

Inner City Press; I was just in the North Lawn and I was told that Mr. Jeffrey Feltman of DPA [Department of Political Affairs] is meeting…I saw Bashar Ja’afari go in. I’m told that the topic is Mr. Brahimi. So my question to you is: because Martin Nesirky was willing to say that there are consultations with the permanent members of the Security Council about such an appointment, is Syria and its permanent representative, will they be conferred with prior to an announcement, whoever the name is?

Deputy Spokesperson Del Buey: I will have to check on that. I don’t know exactly who the consultation list is comprised of.

  Nine hours later, no response. But a well place Gulf source tells Inner City Press Brahimi is the Arab League's nominee, and will a more anti-Assad mandate than Kofi Annan had or acted under.

  It is still time to speed through some of Brahimi's positions. The US, Hillary Clinton in particular, opposed General Douglas Lute favoring Brahimi over Holbrooke on Afghanistan in 2010.

  Brahimi also said, in a 2008 interview, that Europe is a political midget.

Brahimi to his credit in March 2009 wrote, of Sri Lanka, "being a spectator when 150,000 thousand people are trapped in a death zone is not an option."

  That is, sadly, what the UN did, and now even has as a Peacekeeping adviser to Ban Ki-moon and Herve Ladsous one of the generals responsible for the killing, even according to Ban's own experts' report: Shavendra Silva.

  Brahimi is on the Advisory Council of the Sri Lanka Campaign, which of attacks on Inner City Press wrote this, about those who "played straight into the hands of the Government of Sri Lanka's attempts to silence its critics."

So which Brahimi would it be? Watch this site.

Reuters & AFP Sought Ouster from UN of Inner City Press, US Records Show

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, August 8 -- When the US government broadcaster Voice of America asked the UN on June 20 to "review" the accreditation status of Inner City Press, the UN Correspondents Association's president Giampaolo Pioli and first vice president Louis Charbonneau of Reuters claimed they had nothing to do with the request.

   On June 30, however, the two demanded that Inner City Press withdraw a Freedom of Information Act request it had filed for records related to VOA's complaint, or face a release of a one-sided UNCA report and a subsequent show trial seeking to vote Inner City Press out.

   Inner City Press did not withdraw the FOIA request. It stopped writing about the dispute until now, on August 8, when some 800 pages of documents requested under FOIA were released, while at least 150 pages have been withheld. (An appeal is being prepared).

   Even on first review, the documents show that Reuters and Agence France Presse, among others, were part of the campaign to get Inner City Press thrown out of the UN. They conferred with "UN officials," yet to be named; Reuters conferred with the US Mission to the UN.

  On June 18 at 12:40 pm, VOA's Margaret Besheer e-mailed her editor Steve Redisch that "My Reuters colleague just told me his people are probably going to go the same route - to press UN to pull Mr. Lee's UN accreditation." Click here for that e-mail, released August 7 under FOIA.

   The "Reuters colleague" is UNCA president in waiting Lou Charbonneau, who expressed outrage at Inner City Press complaining of his byline on unauthorized uncredited use of Inner City Press exclusive reporting, then said he has a policy of not crediting Inner City Press.

   When Besheer, Charbonneau and others -- the names have been redacted -- received a complaint about their censorship campaign that was send to Capitol Hill and to the US Mission to the UN, Besheer recounts that Charbonneau "asked the US Mission" about the complaint.  Click here that e-mail, including a threat that Reuters would sue Inner City Press.

  Reuters' threats came after Inner City Press several times requested a copy of the company's policy for crediting the exclusives for other, smaller media from four Reuters officials: Stephen J. Adler, Editor in Chief; Greg McCune, Ethics & Training; Walden Siew, Top News Editor; and Paul Ingrassia, Deputy Editor in Chief.

  Reuters never responded, but rather sought to "press the UN to pull" Inner City Press' accrediation, along with Agence France Presse.

Charbonneau shakes -- on what? -- with Ban Ki-moon, (c) Luiz Rampelotto

   As to Agence France Presse, on June 18 at 12:58 pm, Besheer wrote to VOA's lawyers that

"My AFP colleague asks if they could possibly get the tenor of our letter so they can stay on message and ask In the same way. Their legal dept is in France, so It would be their regional director in Washington contacting UN on their behalf."

  The "AFP colleague" is Timothy Witcher who previously sought to use the UNCA bureaucracy to admonish Inner City Press for an accurate article concerning the French Mission to the UN and Herve Ladsous, the fourth Frenchman in a row to head UN Peacekeeping.

  They couldn't stop Inner City Press from reporting, so they sought to get it thrown out of the UN.

 On June 11, citing Bloomberg News, Besheer wrote that "UNCA now discussing with UN officials (very quietly) next steps... They will have to step up and do their part -and pull his accreditation. It is my understanding that UN legal dept is now involved." Click here to view this troubling e-mail, regarding which we will have more.

   Who were these UN officials discussing quietly with the UN Correspondents Association the planned ouster from the UN of Inner City Press?

  The documents produced include a response to VOA's Redisch from UN official Stephane Dujarric, formerly the spokesman for Kofi Annan, referring to Redisch's emailed complaint against Inner City Press of the previous day, stating "Dear Steve, thank you for your email. I will call you later this week. Click here.

  But also on June 21, the records also show, once Inner City Press obtained and published the (first) complaint on the same day it was filed, VOA received nearly immediate inquiries from Capitol Hill about its attack on freedom of the Press and in particular Inner City Press' investigative journalism at the UN.

  On the Broadcasting Board of Governors, which ostensibly oversees VOA, demands were made for copies of Besheer's and her editor Steve Redisch's e-mails.

  In one e-mail, Redisch wonders how the requesters on the Hill would like Inner City Press if it were covering the Senate.

  At the UN, the official to whom the request to "review" Inner City Press was directed, Dujarric, first denounced Inner City Press for obtaining and publishing the request, then ultimately begrudgingly granted Inner City Press a shorter extension of credentials than in previous years, while leaving the VOA threat pending.

  Dujarric's incoming boss Peter Launsky- Tieffenthal has been asked by the New York Civil Liberties Union to describe the UN's process for accrediting journalists, with specific reference to Voice of America's complaint against Inner City Press. Click here for that.

  The UN and UNCA both claim to be unrelated, as regards accrediation. But not only is this UNCA a party to the UN's Media Access Guidelines - the records released today should the submission of UNCA supposedly internal documents to VOA in support of its complaint to try to get Inner City Press expelled by and from the UN. We will have more on this.

  Perhaps most unseemly for the UN, at the heart of the dispute is an attempt by UNCA president Giampaolo Pioli to get removed from the Internet a factually accurate September 21, 2011 Inner City Press story that Pioli in the past rented one of his 12 Manhattan apartments to Palitha Kohona, then the chief of the UN Treaty Section.

  In September 2011 Pioli without first checking with elected UNCA Executive Committee members like Inner City Press granted the request of his former tenant Kohona, now Sri Lanka's Ambassador to the UN, to screen a Sri Lankan government propaganda film denying the very 2009 war crimes that UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon was forced to commission a report about.

Pioli behind UNCA banner, Kohona & Silva not shown, (c) Luiz Rampelotto

  At the screening Pioli granted, Kohona was joined by General Shavendra Silva, reportedly responsible for 4500 deaths in May 2009, who is now on Ban's Senior Advisory Group on Peacekeeping Operations. Ladsous has refused to answer Inner City Press questions on this, or anything else.

  On June 1, Lynne Weil wrote to three Voice of America officials that UNCA was"moving to expel a member whose apparent aggressiveness in interviewing a UN official prompted a UNCA investigation." E-mail here, emphasis supplied.

  Pioli told Inner City Press to take the story down, or he would get Inner City Press thrown out of the UN.

  The Voice of America documents released today under FOIA make plain that the basis for trying to throw Inner City Press out of the UN was entirely what it wrote or in one case said.

  Inner City Press commented to Besheer that some on Capitol Hill might question the use of taxpayer money to try to throw an investigative reporter out of the UN. Besheer trumped up this remark as a "threat" -- which VOA has since described as such in the course of the resulting inquiry (on which we'll have more soon.)

  That there would be Congressional interest turned out to be accurate, and within days of the June 20 complaint, VOA's lawyers were preparing a draft memo for the BBG Governors which include, among others, Dana Perino and Hillary Clinton.

  Then it was decided that "less is more." There follow a slew of heavily redacted pages. Inner City Press is preparing a FOIA appeal of these withholdings, and will continue to report on the documents.

Besheer in front of UNCA logo, taxpayer $ not show, (c) Luiz Rampelloto

  Questions include is it legitimate not only for a US government broadcaster like VOA but global wire services like Reuters and Agence France Presse (which derives over 40% of its income from French government "subscriptions") to meet secretly with UN officials conspiring to get a smaller, investigative web site thrown out of the UN? Watch this site.

August 6, 2012

On Syria, As Russia Nixes Ahtisaari, India On Abstention, Strange Rights of Reply

By Matthew Russell Lee, Partial exclusive

UNITED NATIONS, August 3 -- When the UN General Assembly reconvened for speeches after the Saudi resolution on Syria was adopted with 133 in favor, 31 abstaining and 12 against, Inner City Press asked Russian Permanent Representative Vitaly Churkin what his country thought of Maarti Ahtisaari as a replacement for Kofi Annan as envoy to Syria.

   "No, no, he is in deep retirement," Churkin told Inner City Press. Russia clashed with Ahtisaari over his position on Kosovo.

   Inner City Press asked Indian Permanent Representative Hardeep Singh Puri about his country's abstention. He indicated that if the "welcoming" of the Arab League's resolution had instead been "noting," India might have voted yes. He also, in the GA Hall, condemned terrorism in Syria.

   India's abstention allowed the argument, made to Inner City Press at the beginning of the afternoon's session, that more the half of the world's population did not support the Saudi resolution.

   Inner City Press asked the Saudi Permanent Representative about this and he said, Then they could change the way we vote. India's Hardeep Singh Puri added, we believe in One Country, One Vote.

   Syria's Permanent Representative Bashar Ja'afari indicated that this couldn't be an Arab League resolution, since two Arab countries had not supported it. Beyond Syria's negative vote, Algeria abstained.

   Inner City Press was asked via Twitter why Yemen sponsored the resolution but then did not vote. The answer is that Yemen is behind in due and not allowed to vote, despite being pointed to as one of the UN's few "successes" this year.

  Tanzania also abstained, explaining it was due to resolution's lack of focus on "external forces."

  Argentina, whose opposition to the stronger version of the draft had an impact as exclusively reported by Inner City Press, voted yes but said afterward the resolution does NOT in any way authorize force to protect civilians. Thou dost protest too much?

  Similarly, Nigeria said it does NOT support the Arab League's July 22 decisions or telling the Syrian opposition to unify. But Nigeria voted yes.

  New Zealand said that it "joins China" in regretting Kofi Annan quitting. Why China? Well, New Zealand will be running for a UN Security Council seat in a year. That's often what these speeches are about.

  Canada opined that "Annan" Six Point Plan is dead. But like Russia's Churkin said of the UNSMIS mission, it could just be renamed.

   Libya's Ibrahim Dabbashi -- many are unclear if he or Shalgam is the Permanent Representative -- called on the General Assembly to do two things it can't -- impose sanctions and make referrals to the International Criminal Court -- and one thing it could do: try to strip credentials, as happened also for Laurent Gbagbo's Cote d'Ivoire.

  At the end there were Right to Reply statements. Iran trashed the "Zionist Regime." Germany spoke, but did not reply on Syria's statement about its sale of nuclear submarines to Israel.

  The EU deputy representative spoke, but did not reply to critique of EU sanctions. Afterward he told Inner City Press that under the current resolution, the EU does not HAVE a right to reply. That might be a problem.

  Bahrain replied that the forces in its borders "are from Al Jazeera." One wag mused, well that clears it up. And then the debate ended. We will have more on this -- watch this site.

At UN, Broken Elevators, Hot Offices, No Drinking Water After Capital Master Plan

By Matthew Russell Lee, Exclusive

UNITED NATIONS, August 2 -- Returns to the UN Headquarters tower have been less than smooth, after a rehabilitation which Inner City Press showed featured massive cost overruns. UN staff have exclusively complained to Inner City Press of getting stuck in the "renovated" elevators, about uncontrollable window blinds which leaves the offices overheated, and now about a lack of drinking water.

According to staff, after bad-tasting water was repeatedly noted, the UN shut down the system and ordered bottled water to be trucked in and taken upstairs. All this while yet more staff are slated to move in this coming weekend.

"Where did all the money go?" a staff member demanded to know. "Two billion dollars for this?"

The UN's Fifth (budget) Committee, now slated to be taken over by a Sri Lankan diplomat named in Secretary General Ban Ki-moon's report on war crimes in that country, has until now raised numerous questions about cost overruns in the Capital Master Plan, run by American Michael Adlerstein.

The US quietly let the UN keep tens of millions of dollars in so-called Tax Equalization Funds, but for securing the Conference Rooms over the East River. But no drinkable water? Watch this site.

July 30, 2012

On Syria, Mood Has Changed, UN Front-Runner, Rwanda Like Exit?

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, July 27 -- Norwegian General Robert Mood, after having declined to renew his contract to head the observer mission in Syria which is being dismantled by UN Peacekeeping chief Herve Ladsous, made this observation, dateline Oslo:

"In my opinion it is only a matter of time before a regime that is using such heavy military power and disproportional violence against the civilian population is going to fall."

   While prefaced with "in my opinion," the verdict within an hour was getting big play in Western media, akin to an endorsement late in a political campaign.

   But one wonders: did the UN say this about, for example, Sri Lanka's Rajapaksa government's use of even heavier military power killing 40,000 civilians, nearly all of them Tamils, in northern Sri Lanka in May 2009?

   The answer is, No. And the reasons, we posit, is because the UN did not think the government would fall. The UN in this view is like a casual sports fan coming to loudly root for the team it thinks is about to win.

   And in the nitty-gritty decision making of Ladsous' UN Peacekeeping, the goal seems to be not doing what is possible to protect civilians but rather to get out of the way, or look the other way, and let this overthrow take place.

   Even as the UN Security Council debated two competing draft resolutions to extended the mission in Syria UNSMIS, the UN under Ladsous had three planes deployed in Beirut, ready to pull all UN observers out.

  Some ask: how is this different from the UN's pull out from Rwanda, which the UN has had to live down and apologize for since 1994?

  As Inner City Press has noted before, Ladsous in 1994 was France's Deputy Permanent Representative at the UN, supporting the murderous Hutu government in the Security Council. Noting this historical fact and others has led Ladsous to refuse all questions from Inner City Press.

  And coming full circle, in his analogy how does Mood, the Oslo Oracle, compare with General Romeo Dallaire? We will continue on this. Watch this site.

July 23, 2012

To Extend Syria Mission, West Drops Troops to Barracks Condition

By Matthew Russell Lee, Partial exclusive

UNITED NATIONS, July 20 -- In order to avoid a second day of vetoes, the European sponsors of Friday's Syria mission resolution made a significant change to their draft.

  As Inner City Press first reported, putting the new draft online prior to the vote, they dropped the condition that Assad's troops should leave cities and return to barracks. Click here to view the final text, compared to the draft. Also see below.

  Inner City Press asked US Ambassador Susan Rice about dropping the condition of "pullback of military concentrations in and around population centers, as well as to withdraw its troops and heavy weapons from population centers to their barracks."

  Rice emphasized that the US was not a sponsor of the resolution -- in fact, as Inner City Press first reported, Rice on Thursday when asked if the US wanted the UNSMIS mission extended said no -- and urged Inner City Press to "speak to the author, who I think will be coming behind me.  We frankly prefer the text that included all of paragraph 2 [of Resolution 2043], but we were able to accept the draft that was voted today."

  The UK's Mark Lyall Grant was next, and to his and his spokesman's credit took the question. Lyall Grant said Syria must comply with all aspects of the Six Point Plan, including "paragraph two which as you rightly say... including return of troops to the barracks."

  He said "some Members of the Council argued that we were setting the bar too high for a possible extension of UNSMIS, so we decided to focus that condition on the one posed a direct threat to the Security of the mission."

  Germany's Peter Wittig followed, and also took the Press question, unlike previously. He said, we had consultations this morning, so we tried our best to come together. That was a change in the spirit of compromise to get everybody behind the draft.

  Inner City Press asked China's Permanent Representative Li Baodong about the change. He said, there are a lot of new developments, we want to see Kofi Annan's mediation continue.

  When Russia's Vitaly Churkin came out, Inner City Press asked him about Thursday's statement by US President Obama's spokesman Jay Carney that the Annan plan "failed thus far, yes. And the failure of the Security Council to support this resolution means that it can't go forward."

  Churkin disagreed, saying "Kofi Annan continues his work, the key ingredient is to try to put together a dialogue between the government and the opposition."

  Churkin was told that he'd said "this extension gives Kofi Annan a chance," and was asked if "the new meeting of Friends of Syria might disrupt this process." Churkin scoffed, let's not make a rigid linkage between Kofi Annan and the monitoring mission.

Later Inner City Press asked Churkin specifically about what was deleted from the UK draft, and why. He smiled and said, "Matthew, the Security Council holds closed consultations to keep some secrets. You want us to give you all the secrets about the work of the Security Council. Then we could invite you... to answer all your questions." Well, why not?

  From the outside it seems that faced with the threat of a second day of vetoes, and with the prospect of the UN and Security Council become even more irrelevant to the Syrian crisis, the European agreed to this change, and the US went along, while calling it 30 days to pull out. So the can is kicked down the road; there will be more Security Council fights around Ban Ki-moon's 15 day report, and whether to extend further in 30 days. Watch this site.

  Here is the modified draft approved on July 20, 2012:

​Commending the efforts of the United Nations Supervision Mission in Syria (UNSMIS),

​1.​Decides to renew the mandate of UNSMIS for a final period of 30 days, taking into consideration the Secretary-General’s recommendations to reconfigure the Mission, and taking into consideration the operational implications of the increasingly dangerous security situation in Syria;

​2.​Calls upon the parties to assure the safety of UNSMIS personnel without prejudice to its freedom of movement and access, and stresses that the primary responsibility in this regard lies with the Syrian authorities;

​3.​Expresses its willingness to renew the mandate of UNSMIS thereafter only in the event that the Secretary-General reports and the Security Council confirms the cessation of the use of heavy weapons and a reduction in the level of violence sufficient to allow UNSMIS to implement its mandate;

​4.​Requests the Secretary-General to report to the Council on the implementation of this resolution within 15 days;

​5.​Decides to remain seized of the matter.

  Dropped is the reference to "full implementation of paragraph 2 of resolution 2043."

As Ladsous Justifies Refusing Press Qs, Stonewalls on Mercenaries & DRC Killings

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, July 20 -- Can it be legitimate for a UN official paid hundreds of thousands of dollar a year, tax free, to refuse to any and all questions from a UN accredited journalist based solely on the journalist's critical coverage?

  Secretary General Ban Ki-moon and his Peacekeeping chief Herve Ladsous have taken this position for eight weeks now. Yesterday the position was reiterated, and requested answers not provided.

  Ladsous' spokesman Kieran Dwyer on July 19 wrote that Inner City Press' written coverage of "Ladsous since he took up his position have made it impossible to have a professional engagement with Inner City Press on the substance of peacekeeping work."

  A question is, whose lack of "professionalism" was on display on June 17, when at a stakeout on UN Television Inner City Press asked Ladsous for his response to Spain cutting its troop contribution to the UN Mission in Lebanon in half, and if his Mission in the Congo had as reported killed civilians.

Ladsous refused to answer either question, and Dwyer quotes himself as saying, "we are on the record as not answering your questions due to your personal attacks." Video here, Minute 6:50.

 Ladsous began this strategy of explicitly conditioning answering or even taking question on getting positive -- and we and others posit, as yet unmerited -- coverage on May 29 in a televised press conference, and has continued it off camera since.

   Can critical coverage of the job performance of a international civil servant be called the type of "personal attack" that justifies refusing to answer questions about job (and Department) performance?

   Dwyer writes that his on-camera July 17 refusal to answer was "in line with Under-Secretary-General Ladsous’s response to your noon briefing question of 29 May, when he said 'I will start answering your questions when you stop insulting me and spreading malicious and insulting insinuations.'"

   Again, can the publication of reviews of DPKO's performance under Ladsous, and his plans for example for the use of drones which several member states have criticized as not having enough safeguards be construed as "malicious and insulting insinuations"?

  By contrast, at the same stakeout position where Ladsous and Dwyer on July 17 refused to answer basic questions about the UNIFIL and MONUSCO missions, on July 20 Ambassadors Rice, Lyall Grant, Wittig, Li and Churkin all took and answered questions from Inner City Press.

  Diplomats employed by their own nations -- in these cases the US, UK, Germany, China and Russia, respectively -- might more easily say they can openly refuse to answer particular journalists' or media's questions.

  But Ladsous is paid by the UN, that is, by global taxpayers. He claims that he does not work for France.

   So on what basis does he refuse to do what Ambassadors Rice, Lyall Grant, Wittig, Li and Churkin do? (It might be worth noting that of all the Ambassadors who spoke at the Security Council stakeout in the past two days the only one who, through his spokesman, refused to take any question from Inner City Press was French Ambassador Gerard Araud.)

  After receiving Dwyer's justification for his and Ladsous' refusal to answer questions, which was copied to Ban Ki-moon's two top spokesmen, Inner City Press replied that it is "opposed to conditioning answering or even taking questions on the content of press coverage" and "will continue to ask questions, including about DPKO and its missions, and to report on the responses, or lack of responses."

   Inner City Press then after Thursday's Security Council meeting asked four questions of DPKO, and two of Ban Ki-moon's Secretariat, none of which have been answered or even acknowledged by mid-Friday afternoon:

I would still on Syria like a description of USG Ladsous' role in the June 15 notification to the Security Council that UNSMIS has limited its mobile operations in Syria as of 18:00 hours local that day, see http://www.innercitypress.com/icp1syriadpko061512.pdf

and an explanation of the steps taken since the S-G (and presumably USG Ladsous) received UNSMIS' report on Houla, where in the UN he referred it and why it has not even now been provided to the Security Council, according to several Council members.

  Also from today, I'd like an answer how SRSG Martin Kobler's stakeout statement that UNAMI does not use private military (or security) contractors other than for dogs comports with these two budget lines:

HART SECURITY LIMITED    CYP    Training, other    $437,444    11AMI-20387    UNAMI

HART SECURITY LIMITED    CYP    AMI/CON/2011/041    Provision of Security Awareness Induction Training Training (SAIT) for UNAMI    1-Aug-11    31-Jul-12    $1,143,682    UNAMI

  This last seems to runs through July 31, 2012 - still in force.

I am also requesting to be informed whenever MONUSCO finishes its review of the effects of its use of helicopter gunships / missiles in North Kivu. 

  Those were:

what is the UN's response to this criticism from Sierra Leone (here), and to the Staff Union's statement yesterday urging the S-G to do more on staff detentions in Myanmar and prison term in Ethiopia?

 No noon briefing questions were taken on Thursday, and there was no noon briefing at all on Friday -- the point here is that there might have been time to answer at least one of these questions. But at least as to Ladsous, there is a stated "on the record" policy of not answering Press questions. Is that legitimate? 

  As Inner City Press wrote on July 18, we'll pursue this -- and, we hope, answers to the questions Ladsous refused to answer or even take, on top of the unanswered questions about DPKO introducing cholera into Haiti, and Ban and Ladsous having as a Senior Adviser on Peacekeeping Operations an alleged war criminal, Sri Lankan general Shavendra Silva.

 Notably Ladsous did take Press questions earlier in May, and what he fastened on between then and May 29 is mysterious and / or troubling. Watch this site

July 16, 2012

At UN, Still No Answer to NYCLU on Accreditation Rules, 48 Hours Notice

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, July 11 -- One week ago today, the New York Civil Liberties Union wrote to UN officials asking for a public explanation of their standards for revoking media accreditation.

  NYCLU's request was explicitly triggered by Voice of America's executive editor Steve Redisch's June 20 request to the UN's Stephane Dujarric, on behalf of VoA's Margaret Besheer and unnamed "others," to "review" the accreditation status of Inner City Press. (While the Broadcast Board of Governors has sought delay, Inner City Press' Freedom of Information Act request to determine among other things the identity of these "others" is proceeding.)

  On July 6, Inner City Press asked the Office of the Spokesperson for Secretary General Ban Ki-moon for their response to NYCLU's request. In the five days since there has been no response at all.

   But on July 11, Ban's lead spokesman Martin Nesirky told Inner City Press, "I'm going to have another word with Stephane Dujarric about this" -- apparently because he didn't like how Inner City Press asked a question about Western Sahara.

  This shows the lack of awareness by the UN, at least by the Secretary General's lead spokesman, that there is a problem turning a disagreement about press questions or coverage into complaints to the UN's media accreditation officials.

  Now Inner City Press has become acutely aware of another sample problem of UN media accreditation, the case of a journalist covering the UN for 17 years on issues ranging from disarmament and develoment to the indigenous who has now been told, with only 48 hours notice, to either produce a new letter of accreditation or give up not only his cubicle office space but also his accreditation.

  Inner City Press interviewed the journalist at issue on Wednesday night and was shocked by the lack of notice, and by the lack of support he received from the Correspondents Association, whose president merely advised him to "get another letter."

   The reality is that other reporters at the UN, including non UNCA members, have been given far longer to regularize their status, after a former employer either disavowed them or went bankrupt. It's as the NYCLA has asked: what ARE the rules?

  If there are other unstated reasons for this "purge," some raised behind the scenes by Xinhua and the Correspondents Association's president against one of his own members, they should be disclosed and a response allowed -- that's what the NYCLU letter and applicable case law requires. Watch this site.

July 9, 2012

After NYCLU Writes to UN, UNCA Files Bogus Report With Government, "Judge" With DSS, New Lows at UN

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, July 5, updated -- Tuesday afternoon the New York Civil Liberties Union put out a press release questioning US government agency Voice of America's complaint to the UN to review the accreditation of Inner City Press.

Three hours later someone in the UN Correspondents Association filed a copy of the bogus report commissioned by UNCA President Giampaolo Piolo and his Big Media puppet masters / Hamptons house guests with government authorities to try to get them to act against Inner City Press.

The report is marked "confidential," and as announced by Pioli's Secretary Barbara Plett of BBC on Tuesday afternoon, is only for "UNCA members in good standing." So one of them is responsible for the (anonymous) retransmission to government authorities.

Was this the goal of the report all along?

In fact, Inner City Press at 4 pm on Thursday went to UNCA's office and asked how seeing the report worked. The office worker, seemingly paid by Pioli himself (as reported, he is renting out a Hamptons mansion for $90,000 a month) fumbled around and was unable to find the copy of the report she was in charge of. How to listen to the UNCA audio recording of the Executive Committee's Kafka-esque July 3 meeting was also unclear.

Inner City Press' request to see the "information available on request" cited in the report, ignored by the Board of Examination chair William M. Reilly and the two remaining Examiners, was conveyed to Pioli through his Secretary, so far without response.

Simultaneously, one of Pioli's three "Board of Examination" members, Ali Barada of An-Nahar,  filed a complaint against Inner City Press with the "Special Investigations Unit" of the UN Department of Safety and Security.

  The only basis? What Inner City Press said when Barada bragged that he immediately deleted without opening Inner City Press' email requesting to see the "information available on request" listed in the report Barada signed off on - and which was then sent anonymously to the government against Inner City Press.

  In fact, while all Inner City Press responded with was a run of the mill host country insult, Barada cited his involvement with a "terrorist" group, as a reason Inner City Press shouldn't express its opinion.

Update: And on Friday, July 6, Inner City Press had to spend two and a half hours with UN Security responding to Barada's frivolous and pretextual complaint. Then at noon Ban Ki-moon's Deputy Spokesman had no response to the NYCLU's request.

This gang gets more and more anonymous, just as the supposedly "for UNCA members only" June 14 letter got posted as an anonymous "Mundo111" comment on a story about UNCA anti-Press campaign on the Guardian.co.uk.

Barada's complaint is similar to one by Louis Charbonneau of Reuters, copied to Pioli, his Treasurer Margaret Besheer of the aforementioned VOA and AFP's Tim Witcher, claiming that Inner City Press saying "you disgust me" when Charbonneau tried to organize a session to oust Inner City Press without informing it the WORST thing Charbonneau has seen in 20 years of reporting.

  Really?

  Charbonneau's complaint was to the Department of Public Information, but now the NYCLU has written there. So Barada's complaint, also only about speech, is directed to the Department of Safety and Security. Once out on First Avenue and west, the NYPD would laugh at a complaint about such speech.

  But ironically, while the First Amendment stops on First Avenue, pathetic attempts to file complaints about mere speech and get the Press ejected are even entertained here east of First Avenue, in the Alice in Wonderland that Ban Ki-moon's UN has become. Watch this site.

July 2, 2012

On Syria, As Clinton Claims Text Ousts Assad, Lavrov Laughs

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, June 30 -- When six hours late Kofi Annan emerged from the Action Group on Syria to speak, his key line to the press when asked if Bashar Assad will end 2012 in power or at the International Criminal court was that he'd left his crystal ball at home.

  The real news was in the back to back press conferences of Hillary Clinton and Sergey Lavrov. Clinton, who took only two questions, claimed that despite agreeing to significant Russia demanded changes to Kofi Annan's draft, Assad still couldn't remain in power under the "mutual consent" clause. She then took questions from AP and Saudi-funded Al Arabiya and moved on.

  Lavrov came out and mocked those who'd claimed they wouldn't agree to change "even a comma," noting the major changes Russia got.

  The draft would have "exclude[d] from government those whose continued presence and participation would undermine of the transition and jeopardize stability and reconciliation." Russia got this removed.

He focused on those funding the opposition who want a spiraling of violence, and chided those - Hillary - who blocked the presence at the Action Group of Iran.

  In the crowd was General Robert Mood, who as Inner City Press exclusively reported yesterday should be leaving on July 20, as the UN Secretariat has proposed to downshift UNSMIS to a political mission.

  There were a lot of UN alumni in the crowd: former Deputy Permanent Representatives of China and of the UK (Karen Pierce), as well as former UK political coordinator David Quarrey. Click here for that, and watch this site.

After Voice of America & UNCA Seek to Oust ICP from UN, Legal Notification

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, June 28 -- The five Big Media representatives on the UN Correspondents Association Executive Committee who started a "Board of Examination" probe of Inner City Press a month ago claimed that was not to oust the Press from the UN.

  But on June 20 the executive editor of one of the Five, Voice of America, filed a complaint with the UN seeking just that: a review of the status of Inner City Press' accreditation to the UN, based entirely on things the Press has written. Click here for full text of VOA complaint to the UN.

  Eight days later, the UNCA Executive Committee & Board of Examination have received a legal letter notifying them of violations of free speech, free press and due process: click here to view.

  Precipitating this letter was word that this Board of Examination would issue its report, without even having informed Inner City Press of the charges against it, on Friday, June 29, unless Inner City Press agreed to blanket apologies and even a censorship commitment not to ever write about other media organizations.

  On June 21 Inner City Press told the four remaining members of the Board of Examination that this VOA complaint and challenge to its livelihood made it nearly impossible to continue discussions with UN Correspondents Association president Giampaolo Pioli about how to "clarify" the fact that he rented his apartment to Palitha Kohona, then a UN official, now Sri Lankan Ambassador to the UN.

  Pioli in September 2011 granted Kohona's request to screen inside the UN a Sri Lankan government propaganda film called "Lies Agreed To," which purports to rebut a UK Channel 4 documentary that was NOT screened inside the UN.

  On the podium were only Kohona, Pioli, and alleged war criminal Sri Lankan General Shavendra Silva, who subsequently became an adviser to Secretary General Ban Ki-moon on peacekeeping operations.

   These are facts; the UNCA Executive Committee on June 14 issued a letter "for UNCA members only" which is now their response to the media and which claims Inner City Press never objected to the "Lies Agreed To" screening.

That is false.

  Inner City Press has shown the Executive Committee and now the Board of Examination that "before the screening, Inner City Press wrote to Pioli, Charbonneau, Voice of America's Margaret Besheer and others about 'the UNCA screening of the Sri Lankan government's rebuttal to Channel 4's "Killing Fields": -- I don't remember any email asking if that screening should happen in the UN auditorium, given that the underlying Channel 4 film not not shown in the UN.'"

   The circulation of an "UNCA members only" letter, with this falsehood, and the failures to explain or act on the VOA / UNCA attempt disaccredit me and deny me my livelihood, have come to the fore.

   And so here is the UNCA Board of Examination's June 25 inquiry, and Inner City Press' response:

Dear Matthew, A few days ago, as chair of the Board of Examination of the UN Correspondents Association's Executive Committee I asked if you had any submission's for the panel. There was no response.

June 21 you responded to a verbal invitation from other board members and you met with the remaining four of us.

At the end of the 2.5 hour session you said you would give us a proposal on ending the confrontation between the Executive Committee and you. The board members left with the understanding there would be a cooling off period marked with an absence of charges and counter charges by both sides. That apparently was not the case. Are you going to submit anything more to us?

Sincerely,

William M. Reilly, Chair
Board of Examination, UNCA

cc: board members

   Inner City Press immediately responded and asked questions that have yet to be answered:

I am surprised by this message. First, on June 21 you said that given the Voice of America / Margaret Besheer written request to the UN that it review my accreditation, you understood that addressing that threat to my livelihood, which I ascribe to the UNCA Executive Committee and this process that you continue to chair, came first.

What can you tell me has been done in that regard?

I was told on Thursday to draft (or even just "think") about possible clarifications, and that I have done. I was told it was understandable I would just not submit such drafts in writing -- as I told you, a reporter was misled by the UNCA Executive Committee, based on a prior draft submission I made, that I had signed an apology.

Speaking of reporters, and VOA, I wish to bring this to your attention, and I paste it below: http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/303940/time-us-take-stand-press-freedom-un-brett-d-schaefer

You say that before June 21 you asked if I "had any submission's for the panel. There was no response."

When and how are you saying your request was made? While the membership in the Board of Examination has repeatedly shifted, I have made a number of submissions, of questions that I contend must be examined, and of my right to be informed of the charges and witnesses against me, before the 10 day period can begin.

What are the charges? Who are the witnesses? And who will rule on the conflicts of interest and disqualifying pre-judgments that I have identified?

I am covering the current Security Council debate on the Protection of Civilians, at which among others Sri Lanka (which I cover) is about to speak... I request your responses in writing; I made a similar request to the UNCA Executive Committee, to which they have not responded at all.  I ask that you respond in writing to the points above. Thank you in advance.

Matthew Russell Lee, Inner City Press

And so, the legal letter has been filed. Watch this site.

June 25, 2012

Ignoring Syria Scoops, Pioli's UNCA Tries to Pick 2 More Hanging Judges

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, June 17 -- As Press inquiries continued Sunday into the UN's leaked notice Friday that its Syria mission was limiting its "mobile activities," the UN Correspondents Association Executive Committee and President Giapaolo Pioli was engaged in trying to replace the second resigning member of the "Board of Examination" they established to investigate Inner City Press with an eye toward expelling it.

   The first of Pioli's five Examiners to resign was unilaterally replaced on June 15. By whom? By a close friend of a disgruntedly former UN reporter who recently resurrected a complaint about Press reporting of French mission briefings by Sarkozy Permanent Representative Gerard Araud.

  His offer of testimony is implicitly connected to an attempt to get another UN reporting job and return to New York. In the Wild West, now on the far East Side of Manhattan, this is called a hanging judge.

   But, tellingly, on June 15 a second examiner resigned, concluding that a mediated solution has become unlikely. Pioli has demanded a blanket apology for Inner City Press' factual reporting that Pioli rented his apartment to Palitha Kohona, now the Sri Lankan ambassador whose request to screen a war crimes denial film Pioli granted without consulting other Executive Committee members including Inner City Press.

  In order to tone down the death threats from Sri Lankan extremists triggered by the UNCA proceeding, Inner City Press offered a balanced clarification.

  But Pioli has demanded, among other things, that Inner City Press "guarantee that [any] future coverage of the UN" not even mention "other UN correspondents" - including, of course, him. This is censorship.

  But even on Sunday, amid questions raised by Inner City Press' world exclusive of the Syria shut down notice to the Security Council by the UN Department of Peacekeeping Operations, led by the fourth Frenchman in a row Herve Ladsous, Pioli and this five big media entourage continued to try to push forward with their Board of Examination.

   Now the second resignee is proposed to be replaced by an individual who has already expressed a view of the outcome of the case. No jury would include such a person; nor should this UNCA Board of Examination, already a charade and kangaroo court. The individual has been informed of the threats triggered by the Board Pioli's asked him to join as a hanging judge. Now what?

  If it goes forward -- and under the most basic principles of protecting journalists, which UNCA's Constitution claims it does -- then the Examiners should be journalism ethics professors. Let them judge what the problem is: truthful reporting, or a journalist renting his apartment to people he purports to cover.

  Or, as in the case of Pioli, also making campaign contributions to a politician he writes about for the Poligrafici Editoriale Group and its Quotidiano Nazionale, La Nazione, Il Resto de Carlino, Il Giorno and, yes, Quotidiano.net?

   And we are still waiting for a response to formal question put to Pioli's hand-picked chairman, about conflicts and junkets, beyond his one-line answer that he worked for UPI for fifty years. Watch this site.

June 11, 2012

UN Uses UNCA to Ban Free Press, Hypocrisy Like Haiti, Astroturf like Darfur

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, June 9 -- The UN too often preaches one thing but does another. It preaches accountability, then covers up its proven role in introducing cholera into Haiti.

  At a different level, it criticizes governments for dictating with which groups they will negotiate -- for example these days in Syria -- while the UN in New York undermines free press by only negotiating such things as physical access and conditions for reporting with the one entity it has chosen, the UN Correspondents Association.

  The UN has "Media Guidelines," and claims these are legitimate because they were negotiated with "the media." But by "the media" the UN actually only means "UNCA."

  This is similar to the way the Sudanese government created then negotiated with the Liberty & Justice Movement in Darfur, thereby marginalize the actual opposition.

  LJM was founded and is headed, as Inner City Press exposed, by a former UN staff member who for a time was a UN-paid Darfur "rebel." LJM has been dubbed "Astroturf," a synthetic grassless sports surface: fake grassroots.

   The UN's Media Guidelines, formally the "Guidelines on Media Access at United Nations Headquarters," say they are an agreement involving the "Office of the Spokesperson of the Secretary-General" (Ban Ki-moon) and "the United Nations Correspondents Association."

  How can the UN's media access guidelines be dictated by an agreement with UNCA, which does not represent (or defend) all journalists at the UN?

  This is particularly problematic because anyone deemed, without due process, to have violated these UNCA-agreed guidelines will face "withdrawal of their accreditation."

  As previously exposed, a stealth allegation of violation was filed with MALU by Louis Charbonneau, UNCA's First Vice President. Charbonneau is the bureau chief of Reuters which on May 21 made unauthorized uncredited use of Inner City Press' March 28 exclusive story that US official Jeffrey Feltman will come work at the UN.

  So big media can use the UN-legitimated UNCA to seek to expel smaller media which beats them on stories. Then the UN's MALU does not even inform the small media (in this case Inner City Press) that the complaint has been filed. Due process? Not at the UN.

  As simply another example, the UN / UNCA rules agreed with UNCA state that "No cameras or photographers will be allowed in the cordoned off area by the stairs." But some are allowed, and others not.

  Likewise, those on the UNCA Executive Committee have been allowed by the UN to make decisions, fraught with conflicts of interest and payback, on which media get offices, big offices, studios.

  UNCA Executive Committee members have spend much time ensuring themselves big spaces, mostly furthering their own interests and not even those of the other "general" UNCA members, much less non-UNCA members.

  Then there is the question of accreditation of bloggers, which Inner City Press has fought for since arriving to cover the UN.

  The President of UNCA Giampioli Pioli first proposed agreeing with the UN on a rule that would not include bloggers, then would confine them to a footnote, and impose on them a different standard than is applicable to other media.

  In light of the special status the UN accords to UNCA, legally, UNCA's acts can be attributable to the UN.

(An aside on law: on June 8 UNCA's Pioli announced he was "suspending" Inner City Press, an act for which there is no provision in the UNCA Constitution. But he did it, and this is the organization the UN exclusively negotiates the rights of all journalists with.)

So, for example, when the UNCA Executive Committee proceeds with a witch hunt and kangaroo court against Inner City Press, and the process is amplified and turned into threats by Sri Lankan government media and Sinhalese extremists around the world, including in New York -- all of this is attributable to Ban Ki-moon's UN.

  This is particularly true because the UN Secretariat, its Media Accreditation and Liaison Unit, senior advisers to Ban and others have all seen this witch hunt developing, have formally been given copies of the Sri Lanka newspaper articles, and have done nothing.

Apparently, they like it.

  When UNCA President Giampaolo Pioli on June 8 for the upteenth time threatened to sue and bankrupt small media Inner City Press if it did not take down its reporting that Pioli accepted rent money from Palitha Kohona, the UN official who is now, through another revolving door, Sri Lanka's Permanent Representative to the UN -- this too might be attributed to Ban Ki-moon's UN, if not to the Sri Lankan government.

There are other connections. When Inner City Press tried to cover the meetings of Ban Ki-moon's Senior Advisory Group on Peacekeeping Operations to see if alleged war criminal Sri Lankan government Shavendra Silva was still attending, Ban's MALU told Inner City Press No, citing a meeting with UNCA.

It's all very convenient. But in fact, the acts of UNCA are attributable in these ways and many others to the UN. Watch this site.

June 4, 2012

As UNCA Pushes Anti-Press Move, Sri Lanka Says ICP Faces Jail

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, June 3 -- As UN Correspondents Association officials Giampaolo Pioli and Lou Charbonneau of Reuters have proceeded against Inner City Press, they were told that could their campaign set anti media freedom precedents.

  Now, it has. Today a major pro-government newspaper in Sri Lanka, the Sunday Observer, quotes with approval the indictment drafted by Reuters' Charbonneau against Inner City Press.

  The newspaper says that "if the allegations against Lee are proven, the UN headquarters will be made out of bounds for him. If the harassment charges are proven he could face a jail term of up to six years." Click here to view the full article.

   Pioli, assisted by Reuters' Charbonneau and other corporate media which have used without credit Inner City Press' exclusive stories about the UN then retaliated when Inner City Press complained, has pursued a public witch hunt against Inner City Press. Click here for sample UNCA minutes released only tonight from behind Reuters' firewall.

   This has included mass e-mailing out the "charge letter" quoted by the pro-government Sunday Observer. The letter was signed by Charbonneau, Flavia Krause-Jackson of Bloomberg, Talal Al-Haj of Al-Arabia, Margaret Besheer of Voice of America and Timothy Witcher of Agence France Presse.

   Witcher, at the behest of the French Mission to the UN, began the push against Inner City Press for its reporting on French UN Peacekeeping chief Herve Ladsous, who has accepted Sri Lankan general (and alleged war criminal) Shavendra Silva as a Senior Adviser.

   Despite France's claim to support press freedom, not only has its Mission to UN sought to eject Inner City Press and even (unsuccessfully) to have it temporarily arrested. Now, the campaign they have pushed has created an environment in which political enemies can call for the Press to be jailed for six full years.

   Al-Arabiya is funded and controlled by Saudi Arabia, so its increasing involvement in this anti free Press campaign is perhaps not surprising. But that Voice of America, using US taxpayer dollars, would be one of five leaders of an anti Press campaign triggering such a threat is, we hear, becoming a matter of concern to some on Capitol Hill.

   Matthew Winkler of Bloomberg News has yet to respond to submitted questions the propriety of his UN bureau chief's involvement. As noted, there has been no response to two rounds of e-mails to Reuters "Ethics & Training" chief Greg McCune, Top News Editor Walden Siew, deputy editor Paul Ingrassia and big cheese Stephen J. Adler.

  The only Reuters response on this has been Reuters UN bureau chief Lou Charbonneau saying on June 1, before he voted to investigate Inner City Press and sent out the selective minutes, "you are a bad person."

  At Voice of America, before this executives David Ensor, Sonja Pace, David Jones and Steve Redisch were all told of the attacks and were asked to stop them, or least formally disassociate VoA UN bureau chief Margaret Besheer from these efforts resulting in governmental gloating about the possibility of jailing the Press.

   Before the publication of the pro government Sunday Observer's report about exclusion from the UN and jail time, Inner City Press asked the UNCA Executive Committee to desist or at least slow down, because it has "been the subject of extremely negative, unfair, entirely unfounded coverage in for example the Sri Lankan press." 

  But the UNCA Executive Committee has doggedly proceeded, going more and more public even with material they wree told in advance, and acknoweledged, was incomplete if not outright inaccurate.

  Since the origin of these disputes, UNCA president Giampaolo Pioli has repeatedly demanded that Inner City Press remove from the Internet its factual report that Pioli accepted money for rent from Palitha Kohona, Sri Lanka's Permanent Representative to the UN.

  Pioli in an angry telephone call threatened to have Inner City Press thrown out of the UN, an ejection now positively viewed by pro government media in Sri Lanka.

   This calls into question not only the negligent management of Reuters, Bloomberg, AFP, Al-Arabiya and Voice of America, but also WHO is the source of the threats cited in the pro Sri Lanka government Sunday Observer.

    If the Pioli proposed UNCA Board of Examination goes forward even now, it should investigate all of UNCA officials' communications with Palitha Kohona and other alleged war criminal. Watch this site.

May 28, 2012