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At UN, Management Shake-Up Would Send Barcena to Chile, German Kane to Fill the Slot

Byline: Matthew Russell Lee of Inner City Press at the UN: News Analysis

UNITED NATIONS, May 12 -- In the beginning of a shakeup inside the UN, on Monday Under Secretary-General for Management Alicia Barcena informed staff members that she is leaving at the end of May, sources told Inner City Press. She would continue to draw her salary in New York for an extra month, then re-appear, still at the Under Secretary-General level, as the head of ECLAC, the Economic Council for Latin America and the Caribbean based in Santiago, Chile.

            Her replacement as chief management official of the UN will reportedly not be from Latin America, but rather from Germany, a major UN funder which, like Japan, does not have a permanent seat on the Security Council. While initially reports had the Germany chief of the UN's Kosovo Mission Joachim Ruecker getting the job, the wheel has spun to what some call "the other German," Angela Kane, who previously among other things ran the UN's library system.

            A few steps down the UN roster, Barcena's chief of staff Simona Petrova is said to be in line for a move up to the 38th floor, to work with Ban's main advisor Kim Won-soo, while Lena Dissin would take over Ms. Petrova's Management chief of staff role. Long-time Barcena ally Nancy Hurtz-Soyka will in this scenario be named Director of Accountability, a position that has never been approved or funded by the General Assembly -- but who's counting?

            Inner City Press upon receiving these reports from well-placed sources sought comment or denial from Ms. Barcena, but none was received by deadline. Last week, Inner City Press telephoned Ms. Barcena's office seeking comment on the UN Geneva staff union dropping out of the Staff Management Coordination Council, which Ms. Barcena has called the central labor body, the only one she could negotiate with. Days later, still no comment on that. And more than a year after it was described and promised, still no move to even propose a Freedom of Information policy of the UN, under which non-exempt UN information would be available to the press and public not by whim, but by right.

Alicia Barcena at BAN's rostrrum on May 5, Freedom of Information not shown

            An example would be Monday's simple query to the Department of Peacekeeping Operations, whether the $44.6 million owed to Germany concerns the naval and surveillance component of the UN's Interim Force in Lebanon, and to whom the UN pays rent in Haiti. These seem like the kind of questions that could be answered in six or seven hours. But not at the UN. What will these reported changes in Management bring? Watch this site.

The questions put to Alicia Barcena:

Hello -- this is a request on deadline for confirmation or denial, separately, that

(1) you will be leaving UN Headquarters at the end of May;

(2) you will remain on the UN Department of Management payroll to the end of June;

(3)  you will take over as USG at ECLAC after that.

And, separately, that Ms. Petrova will move to the 38th floor Executive Office of the Secretary-General, and Ms. Dissin take her place in DM; Nancy Hurtz-Soyka will get Director of Accountability.

And finally - Angela Kane is in line to head DM?

 The first three seem eminently answerable. And I'd still like to cover your view of Geneva staff union dropping out of SMCC, which I called your office seeking confirmation and comment.

Finally, at a meeting this afternoon... I raised the issue of UN Freedom of Information, when will the Secretariat propose it to the member states... [while the Office of Legal Affairs was referenced] I mentioned you, hoping for follow-through...

            We'll see. All responses and developments will be reported on this site.

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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

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