Inner City Press -- Investigative Reporting From the Inner City to Wall Street to the United Nations

As UN's Doss Hit by OIOS, Council Tries to Save MONUC, Rice Defended, NGOs on Tap

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, April 14 -- The day after the UN's top envoy to the Congo Alan Doss dodged the Press by canceling a scheduled question and answer session, it emerged that Doss is named as a wrongdoer in the long delayed Office of Internal Oversight Services probe of his e-mail urging the UN Development Program to show him "lee-way" and give his daughter a job.

  Inner City Press first published Doss' nepotism e-mail, and reported on the macing and arrest of the UNDP staffer whose job was given to Rebecca Doss, Nicola Baroncini. Mr. Baroncini remains waiting for his day in court.

  Earlier this week, Inner City Press asked chief UN spokesman Martin Nesirky how it could take nine months to investigate Doss' six line e-mail, and Nesirky did not explain. Now Nesirky's associate Farhan Haq has said to Turtle Bay that "There is a draft investigative detail, provided only to Mr. Doss for his comment before a report is finalized. Once finalized, the report will be sent to the secretary-general."

Inner City Press has in the past asked both Secretary General Ban Ki-moon and his top Peacekeeper, Alain Leroy, about l'affaire Doss. Now with the Security Council headed Friday to Kinsasha to try to save the peacekeeping mission Doss has overseen, the negative finding against Doss hurts not only him but the UN.

UN's Doss pensive at last stakeout, which he now skips: it's over

  On this trip, the French mission has said that eight of the Council's 15 members are sending their top representatives, five are sending "Deputy Permanent Representatives" and two, only advisors. While the U.S. seems to qualify for this last designation, since DPR Alejandro Wolff is not going, it emerged on Wednesday that France was considering the U.S. Brooke Anderson as a DPR, despite her current "number four" (at best) status in the U.S. Mission.

  While the Mexicans and Chinese were targeted by France as only sending advisors, from these quarters came a cry of double standards, that the U.S. would be let off the hook. China has no sitting DPR at present, unlike the US. And Mexican Perm Rep Heller is in fact going to more countries in Africa at the same time, for the Somalia Sanctions Committee.

Substantively, Austria has pushed to have Congolese NGOs flown from Goma to Kinshasa to brief the Council. A US Mission representative, reflexively defensive of Susan Rice's non attendance on family issues grounds, nevertheless trashed the Council for not traveling to Goma. But others asked, if you send your Number Four, who are you to criticize? Watch this site.