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With Guinea Bissau Coup Now Accepted by ECOWAS & UN, Cote d'Ivoire Contrast

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, May 11 -- After much talk at the United Nations of not accepting the coup in Guinea Bissau and restoring the overthrown government, on Friday ECOWAS' representative Nurudeen Mohammad said there "is no question of the return" of former prime minister Carlos Gomes and former interim president Raimundo Pereira.

  So much for restoring the government. As the UN Security Council met Friday morning behind closed doors to hear from West Africa envoy Said Djinnit, Inner City Press asked a number of Council members if they are, in fact, accepting the coup in Guinea Bissau.

  One interested delegation argued that the statement by Nurudeen Mohammad, Nigeria's state minister for foreign affairs, may not be the final word, "let's see."

  The claim is that the Monday afternoon meeting involving ECOWAS and the Portuguese language configuration CPLP had gone well in terms of "coordinating" approaches. So was Nurudeen Mohammad not speaking for ECOWAS?

  There is an obvious contrast with the Security Council's approach to Cote d'Ivoire, where after Laurent Gbagbo got at least 45% of the vote but refused to leave power, contesting the results in some districts, the Council authorized force including the involvement of France's Force Licorne until Alassane Ouattara was installed in power, and Gbagbo sent to the ICC in the Hague.

  All of that was done, it was said, to enforce democracy. But here, Carlos Gomes was ousted in a coup, and the coup leaders are given at least 12 months. ECOWAS says Gomes cannot come back, and the Council so far says nothing.

  So was were France's real motives in Cote d'Ivoire? And why is the response to the outright military coup in Guinea Bissau so different?

   We haven't even touched, in this article, the situation in Mali. But we will, soon. Watch this site.

Footnote: France's Ambassador to the UN Gerard Araud, who thundered against Gbagbo and for democracy, has said now he can't talk since France is in an electoral -- actually, post-electoral -- period and he is waiting for his "new authorities." It is still not clear if that means: a new Ambassador...

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Click here for Sept 23, '11 BloggingHead.tv about UN General Assembly

Click for Mar 1, '11 BloggingHeads.tv re Libya, Sri Lanka, UN Corruption

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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

Click here for Sept 26, 2011 New Yorker on Inner City Press at UN

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