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

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, December 12 -- The French-sponsored meeting about protection of journalists held December 13 in the UN will, ironically, be "off the record" and not for recording.

This is contrary to what French foreign minister Laurent Fabius promised when he announced the session, even before other Security Council members agreed to it.

 Fabius said the meeting would be "open to civil society and to the press." Click here for that.

After that, Inner City Press on the day of Council bilateral meetings asked the French delegation if the December 13 session would be on the record, though an "Arria formula" meeting.

  "It's an open Arria," was the response.

At the next day's press conference, at which Inner City Press and the Free UN Coalition for Access planned to ask about this "open Arria," French Ambassador Gerard Araud preemptively announced that all the journalists were invited to the session.

 Araud said, "La rencontre sera entièrement ouverte à la presse, vous êtes bien sûr invités à y participer" -- the event will be ENTIRELY open to the press.

  Apparently this "entirely" does not include being able to report on the event.

  An invitation went out -- to some -- listing among participants not only Araud but also

Mrs Irina Bokova, Director-General of UNESCO,

Mrs Fatou Bensouda, Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court,

Mr David Rohde, Investigative journalist for Thomson Reuters,

Mr Christophe Deloire, Director General of Reporters Without Borders,

Mr Frank La Rue, Special Rapporteur on the Right to Freedom of Opinion and Expression,

Mrs Anne-Marie Capomaccio, Head of Office of Radio France Internationale in Washington.

  But now, it turns out, journalists are invited -- but cannot report on it. Araud's spokesman Frederic Jung sent this e-mail the night before the event:

"We have been advised that due to the specific format of this meeting, discussions will be held =off the record=, with no microphones or cameras."

  So France's event about "protection of journalists" will be "off the record, with no microphones or cameras." As they say... incroyable. Watch this site.