Inner City Press: Investigative Reporting from the United Nations

With UN Ban in Cambodia, Eviction Protests Banned, Rights Are Internal Matter?

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, October 27 -- After leaving Thailand where political gatherings were banned during his stay, UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon is now in Cambodia, where people facing mass eviction for the political elite were banned from protesting along Ban's route.

Inner City Press for the second time asked Ban's spokesman Martin Nesirky if Ban will meet with those threatened with eviction, or just take a letter as he did in Thailand.

Nesirky said that “if there is some kind of written communication these people who are protesting would like to hand over, I'm sure that would be possible.”

But the written petition was already delivered, and Ban was aware of it, without impact. It was reported that “Aimee Brown, a spokeswoman for the Office of the UN Resident Coordinator in Phnom Penh, said Ban knew of the requests, but said his office had not yet decided on whether he would meet them. 'He's definitely aware that there are protestors, and he is aware of the petitions that have been received,' Brown said.” So what's the answer?

UN Ban in Cambodia, those facing eviction not shown

It's already reported that Cambodian “Prime Minister Hun Sen has ordered [Ban] to remove the head of the local UN human rights office, accusing him of acting as a 'spokesman' for opposition groups. During a meeting with Ban at his offices in Phnom Penh this morning, Foreign Minister Hor Namhong said the premier had 'proposed' that Christophe Peschoux, head of the local office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, resign his post.”

Inner City Press asked Nesirky if Peschoux will keep his post. “That's an internal personnel matter,” Nesirky replied. He added that Ban stands behind the office and, by implication, it's staff. Video here from Minute 5:04.

It does not appear that Ban raised the issue of violent anti-drug programs, highlighted by the UN Special Rapporteur on the Right to Health. And Ban's human rights tour goes on.

From the UN transcript of October 25, 2010 --

Inner City Press: I want to ask about the Secretary-General’s impending trip to Asia. There is a report to the Third Committee by the Special Rapporteur on the right to health about, among other things, what he sees as the violated practices in anti-drug programmes in many of the countries that Ban Ki-moon is going to be visiting — Cambodia, Viet Nam, Thailand — and he calls very strongly for the UN to move against people who are incarcerated. This is all according to his report. I just wonder: of the many issues obviously on the Secretary-General’s agenda as he visits these countries, is he aware of that? And there is a separate issue in Cambodia, where people has said that they are going to try and rally in front of Ban Ki-moon about evictions, forced evictions, in Cambodia. Are these… Can you sort of… Can we get a run-down of what issues he is planning to raise, and I just wonder whether these two are among them?

Spokesperson Martin Nesirky: Sure. And again, I seem to recall that Farhan gave you a bit of a run-down on the trip last week, sitting here. As the trip progresses, we will be giving details. The Secretary-General and his delegation are en route at the moment to Thailand where, as you know, the visit starts. They then move to Cambodia and on to Viet Nam for this UN-ASEAN [Association of South-East Asian Nations] meeting and then to China, where, as you know, the Secretary-General will be visiting Shanghai, Nanjing and Beijing. On the question of health, the very specific point that you raised, we can find out and probably tell you as the visit progresses. The same goes for the second part that you mentioned.

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With UN Ban in Bangkok, Political Gatherings Banned, Myanmar Voting on Giri Back Burner?

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, October 26 -- The Asian tour of UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon began in Thailand, with all political gatherings banned. Ban gave a speech saying that Thai problems are for Thais to solve, reported then as “internal affairs.”

When Inner City Press asked Ban's spokesman Martin Nesirky for Ban's view the right to assemble for the redress of grievances, Nesirky replied that Ban had received a letter of protest, from the Red Shirt movement. But does that replace the right to assemble? Ban's spokesman wouldn't answer. Video here from Minute 29:12.

In Nesirky's read out of Ban's time in Thailand, he did not mention the critique by the UN's special rapporteur on the right to health Anand Grover of violent anti-drug programs in the region. (When Inner City Press asked Anand, he said he would raise it with Ban Ki-moon or the Secretariat, video here.)

Myanmar was raised by Ban Ki-moon, but it is not clear how. In New York, the Good Office on Myanmar team, created by the General Assembly, have been reassigned to do other work under the Department of Political Affairs Tamrat Samuel.

The shift, without GA approval, is not mentioned in the Secretariat's “Special Political Missions” submission to the Advisory Committee on Administrative and Budgetary Questions.

Inner City Press asked the UN's humanitarian chief Valerie Amos about media reports that the UN's officer to help Myanmar with Cyclone Giri were rebuffed.

UN's Ban & Thai Abhisit, political gatherings and Myanmar vote not shown

She said that “joint assessments” -- the same term used by the UN in Sudan -- have begun and indicate that the damage may be much larger than first thought, up to 400,000 people.

Can a free, fair and transparent election be held among the impacted people, Inner City Press asked Ms. Amos, in Arakan State and elsewhere? She said this couldn't be known until the joint assessment is completed. The election is slated for November 9. Ban Ki-moon's next stops are Vietnam and Cambodia, where violent anti-drug programs are most extreme. Watch this site.

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Pro-Asia Mahbubani Says Myanmar “Doing Badly,” Ban Ki-moon “In a Rough Patch”

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, October 22 -- Elite pro-Asia academic Kishore Mahbubani, speaking Friday at the Council on Foreign Relations in New York, said that Myanmar is “doing badly.”

Also in response to a question from Inner City Press about the UN Secretary General, Mahbubani's first response was that S-G Ban Ki-moon “has hit a rough patch.”

Given that in other response Mahbubani said that Deng Xioping should have gotten the Nobel Peace Prize and that Asia is a much more serious power than the Muslim world, that he nevertheless could not present a story of an upward trend line about Myanmar or Ban Ki-moon is significant.

By contrast, Ban told Seoul's Yonhap that he is confident in receiving a second terms as S-G (Team Ban contests the translation) and that the reviews of his performance by the international community have been “very positive.” But even Mahbubani could not deliver a positive review.

Mahbubani's remarks were delivered in a wood paneled room over Park Avenue and 68th Street, lined with oil painting of somber Caucasian old men. This was largely the audience, too, but for two younger women who spoke of human rights.

In response, Mahbubani said that human rights cannot be spread by sanctions, and that “after Guantanamo Bay, no one takes the US State Department Human Rights Reports seriously.”

Among the audience were the sister of Senator John Kerry, who works at the US Mission to the UN, and Ban Ki-moon's speechwriter Michael Myer, among with John Brademas and David Denoon of NYU, both of whom asked questions.

Listed but not questioning was “Judith Miller, Journalist.” One wondered what she thinks of Mahbubani's analysis that the US wrongfully spends 80% of its foreign policy on the Muslim world, including Iraq, while it should be devoting those resources to countering China's rise.

Mahbubani, when he was Singapore's PR to the UN, with Sri Lanka's Kohona

While Mahbabani said that China overplayed its hand in strong-arming Japan to return its ship captain, one also wonders what he'd make of China's moves to block the release of a UN Sudan Sanctions Committee report asserting that Chinese bullets were found in Darfur after an attack on UN peacekeepers there. The event ended at 9 am, and Mahbubani said he had to catch at 10 am train.

Footnotes: Mahbubani told the audience that he is used to being attacked, most recently on by a historian while taping this week's Fareed Zakaria GPS show on CNN. He praised Zakaria's piece which praises India -- a regular circle of praise.

Just as Tom Friedman editorialized about conversation with Mahbubani over tea, Mahbubani recounted a talk with a “senior State Department official over tea.” In these heady circles, the UN and Ban Ki-moon are an afterthought, going through a rough patch. Watch this site.

Mahbubani's talk was reminiscent of Tom Plate's "Giants of Asia" talk at the Singaporean Mission to the UN earlier this year, and his book series by that name which now, Inner City Press has been told, will not include Ban Ki-moon. We'll see.

These reports are usually also available through Google News and on Lexis-Nexis.

Click here for a Reuters AlertNet piece by this correspondent about Uganda's Lord's Resistance Army. Click here for an earlier Reuters AlertNet piece about the Somali National Reconciliation Congress, and the UN's $200,000 contribution from an undefined trust fund. Video Analysis here

Other, earlier Inner City Press are listed here, and some are available in the ProQuest service, and now on Lexis-Nexis.

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