UNITED
NATIONS, March
19 -- From the
UN, Secretary
General Ban
Ki-moon talks
about the rule
of law. He
issues
statements
about freedom
of the
press, the
rights of
opposition
parties,
political
pluralism.
Inside
the UN, it's a
different
matter. On
March 18, UN
officials
conducted
a raid,
without notice
or consent, on
the office of
Inner City
Press,
going through
papers and
taking
photographs.
The president
of the
UN's
Censorship
Alliance,
previously
known as the
UN
Correspondents
Association,
Pamela Falk of
CBS took
photographs
too. Video
here.
Perhaps
this
is
“self-regulation
of the press”
-- you get
some big media
which
invariably
makes Ban look
good in
exchange for
access to go
after smaller,
investigative
media.
This
is the pattern
in Ban's UN,
which did not
take place
under his
predecessor
Kofi Annan. In
just the last
year, the UN's
Censorship
Alliance held
a kangaroo
court
proceeding
against Inner
City Press
involving
articles that
it wrote,
about Herve
Ladsous the
fourth
Frenchman in a
row to head UN
Peacekeeping,
about Sri
Lanka, war
crimes and
UNCA conflicts
of interest.
When
the proceeding
gave rise to
death threats
to Inner City
Press from
extremist
supporters of
Sri Lanka's
Rajapaksa
government,
UNCA said
it wasn't its
problem, and
Ban's UN did
nothing. The
message seemed
to be: stop
writing about
it.
(Inner
City Press
hasn't
stopped: it
has for
example
covered Ladsous'
inaction
on 126 rapes
in Minova by
the Congolese
Army, the
UN's
partners; the
UN's lawless
dismissal of
claims it
brought
cholera to
Haiti, which
has killed
over 5000
people, and
Ban's
deteriorating
relations with
UN staff after
he answered
Inner City
Press'
question
by calling his
staff
opponents
“selfish.”)
After
UNCA went to
far as to then
“meet with UN
officials
(very
quietly)”
asking them to
throw Inner
City Press out
of the UN,
then submitted
a
formal request
for the
“review” of
Inner City
Press'
accreditation
from Voice of
America, which
said it had
the support
of Reuters and
Agence France
Presse, Inner
City Press was
summoned to
a talk with
two UN
Department of
Public
Information
officials.
At
that meeting
prior to, and
apparently as
a condition
of, a shorter
than normal
extension of
accreditation,
Inner City
Press was told
to
write more
positively
about Ban
Ki-moon and
about Ladsous.
The UN
didn't think
there was
anything wrong
with this,
explicitly
tying
access to the
building to
more positive
reporting on
Ban and his
deadwood
peacekeeping
chief.
By
late 2012,
Inner City
Press
co-founded the
new Free UN
Coalition for
Access, to
defend
journalists at
and from the
UN, to push
DPI for due
process rules
and even a UN
Freedom of
Information
Act.
FUNCA's
flyers
were torn
down, UNCA
leaders
started at
least four
anonymous
social media
accounts to
try to
undermine
Inner City
Press to
countries
missions to
the UN and to
discourage
joining FUNCA.
Monday's
raid
on Inner City
Press' office,
seen by the
“resident” UN
press
corps -- and
as noted,
ghoulishly
photographed
by UNCA --
should be
seen in this
light. Either,
join FUNCA and
your office
will be
raided, and/or
writing
critically
about Ban
Ki-moon,
Ladsous and
the
UN and your
office will be
raided. And
what next?
Watch this
site.
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