On
Egypt,
After ICP
Reports
Feltman Trip
& UN
Denies, Spoon
Feeds to
Reuters
By
Matthew
Russell Lee
UNITED
NATIONS,
August 16 --
The UN
confirmed that
its Jeffrey
Feltman is
going to
Egypt, when
Inner City
Press asked it
at Friday's
noon
briefing.
But Thursday
night after
the UN
Security
Council
meeting,
and after
Inner City
Press had
exclusively
reported that
Feltman
would go,
the UN
Spokesperson's
Office called
this just a
rumor.
audio
uploaded by
Inner City
Press on
Thursday night
of Egypt's
Permanent
Representative
Mootaz
Ahmadein
Khalil
saying that
"we have been
contacted by
the
Secretariat"
of the UN,
"Mr. Feltman
expressed his
interest to
go." He said,
through
Egypt's
Mission
to the UN,
Feltman asked
"to set up a
number of high
level
meetings and
we have done
so." Inner
City Press audio online
here.
That
the UN
Spokesperson's
Office might
not have had
the
information,
from
the Secretary
General Ban
Ki-moon's
other offices,
on Thursday
night
is one thing.
But on Friday
at 11:57 am,
Reuters' UN
bureau ran a
two
paragraph "report"
that
"U.N.
Under-Secretary-General
for Political
Affairs
Jeffrey
Feltman plans
to visit Egypt
next week to
hear views on
the crisis and
the way
forward, the
United Nations
said on
Friday. 'The
schedule is
still
being worked
out. However,
it goes
without saying
that Mr.
Feltman
intends to
meet with a
range of
interlocutors,
inside and
outside the
government,
including the
Muslim
Brotherhood,'
the United
Nations
said."
At
the noon
briefing,
Inner City
Press asked
Ban's outgoing
deputy
spokesperson
Eduardo Del
Buey how this
information
had been
released.
Who
is this
"United
Nations" that
speaks to
Reuters? If it
is
some sort of
faux
whistleblower
in the
Department of
Political
Affairs,
that's one
thing. But
other
alternatives
are less
palatable
or acceptable.
It
has been
demonstrated
that Reuters'
UN Bureau
Chief Louis
Charbonneau,
as first vice
president of
the UN
Correspondents
Association,
gave an
internal
anti-Press
UNCA
document to UN
official
Stephane
Dujarric,
three
minutes after
saying that he
wouldn't.
Charbonneau
wrote, "You
didn't get
this from me."
Story
here, audio here,
document
here.
Now
Reuters is
spoon-fed
information
that the UN
Spokesperson's
office
had told
others was
mere "rumor"
after Inner
City Press
reported it,
along with
audio uploaded
by Inner City
Press on
Thursday night
of Egypt's
Permanent
Representative
Mootaz
Ahmadein
Khalil saying
that "we have
been
contacted by
the
Secretariat"
of the UN,
"Mr. Feltman
expressed his
interest to
go." He said,
through
Egypt's
Mission
to the UN,
Feltman asked
"to set up a
number of high
level
meetings and
we have done
so." Inner
City Press audio online
here.
How
does this UN
work? We'll
have more on
this. Watch
this site.
, 
