In
Haiti, UN Bolduc Is Out, Coke and Clinton Fete Citigroup,
Siemens
By
Matthew Russell Lee
UNITED
NATIONS, April 7 -- In the midst of the UN's response to Haiti's
earthquake, it has removed its country representative Kim Bolduc,
Inner City Press has discovered.
Told by a source that Ms. Bolduc was
leaving Haiti, on March 31 on the sidelines of the Haiti
donors'
conference Inner City Press asked UN spokesman Martin Nesirky, "do
you know if Kim Bolduc is still performing her function as country
coordinator in Haiti?" While Nesirky answered "Pass, don’t
know," subsequently this came in:
Subject:
Answer to your question on Ms Kim Bolduc
From: @un.org
To:
Inner City Press
Dear
Matthew, Kindly find hereby the answer to your question :Is Ms Kim
Bolduc still performing her duties in Haiti?
"Kim
Bolduc completed her assignment in Haiti on 30 March 2010".
It
is certainly a
strange time to have the country representative's "assignment"
run out.
UN's Ban, Kim Bolduc at table: now you see her, now
you don't
Also
alongside the
Haiti Donors' Conference at the UN, Bill Clinton co-hosted a
corporate event for Coca-Cola, promoting a drink called "Haiti
Hope."
While the
Press was barred from the event, the UN Office
of Partnership' roster of 135 invitees, subsequently obtained, lists
Nestle executives Paul Bulke and Peter Braback, executives from
Citigroup including Vikram Pandit, Siemens and Crescent Petroleum.
And so it goes at the UN.
And here's
from the April
1 transcript of the IMF, titularly a part of the UN system:
INNER
CITY PRESS ONLINE QUESTIONER: At the U.N. yesterday, Mr. Strauss-Kahn
said that the IMF has yet to forgive Haiti’s debt. By contrast, the
IABD has already forgiven $479 million. Can you explain the IMF’s
delay and exactly what Executive Board Meeting it will be when Mr.
Strauss-Kahn will actually propose forgiving Haiti’s debt?
MR.
RICE: In response to this question, I’d really like to refer you to
the statement that we issued yesterday from the Managing Director
when he attended the high-level conference in New York City. And on
the issue of debt relief, what he had said was that there was a
framework--staff was preparing a framework to be put forward for
consideration by the IMF Executive Board on the issue of debt relief
and the IMF...
Watch this site.
* * *
At
UN on Haiti, EU Ashton Dodges, Cannon Fires at Fowler, French Jet
Unaddressed
By
Matthew Russell Lee
UNITED
NATIONS, April 1 -- Amid the self-congratulatory Haiti fest
at the UN
on Wednesday, there was bragging by the European Union, Canada and
others, corporate plugs for Coca-Cola, and many Haitian excluded from
the conference.
The
EU's High
Commissioner Catherine Ashton closed with the dramatic phrase about
the scale of death "in 35 seconds." But earlier on
Wednesday, when Inner City Press asked her about what's described as
her powerplay to get EU development aid under an External Affairs
Unit she is setting up, she dodged as in a quake. There's no
controversy, she said. But that's not what development and poverty
experts say.
Inner
City Press
asked Ashton about two EU members, Germany and France. The former's
been called stingy by German Agro Aid. French development minister
Alain Joyandet spent over 116,000 Euros taking a private jet to a
meeting about poverty in Haiti. Ashton smiled as that question was
asked, but did not answer it. The German question she left to her
Eastern European co-panelist.
Upstairs
at the
stakeout in front of the Trusteeship Council Chamber, high profile
participants praised the meeting and themselves. Canadian foreign
Minister Cannon lauded his country's response. Inner City Press asked
about the criticism by former Canadian (and UN) diplomat Robert
Fowler, that the conservative Canadian government has turned more and
more inwards, and taken sides in the Middle East.
Cannon
said he
would not respond to Fowler, only that he is -- and by implication
Fowler should be -- grateful to the countries which helped get Fowler
released from Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, after he was scooped
up in Niger working for the UN and perhaps Canadian mining interests.
EU's Ms. Ashton previously on Haiti, power play not shown
Back
downstairs the
press spokesman of Japan's foreign minister Okada described his boss'
trip to Washington, Ottawa and New York in seemingly great detail.
But he omitted the discussions of the relocation of American forces
on Okinawa. When asked by Inner City Press, he dutifully described
the issue for the few representatives of Japanese media in the
briefing room, as if they'd never heard of it. And then the briefing
was over.
It
all concluded
with an unwieldy seven person press conference in the UN's basement.
Only three questions were allowed, each apparently pre-selected.
Ban's spokesman called on Spanish wire service EFE, which he had left
off Ban's first trip to Haiti, whose president's spokesman called on
a Haitian journalist from "Scoop." The U.S. State
Department called on Reuters, which asked Hillary Clinton about Iran
and the UN Security Council.
While
Haitian
President Rene Preval rolled his eyes and Ban urged that only Haiti
questions be asked, Hillary Clinton, France's Bernard Kouchner and
Brazil's foreign minister each answered the question. Brazil said as
a non permanent member of the Council, it was not in the loop.
Hillary
Clinton
said that the U.S. viewed seeking Council sanctions as diplomacy,
even negotiations. Kouchner said that "we did try to talk to the
Iranians, we did." Why not allow a question or answer about his
development minister's 116,000 Euro private jet trip about Haiti,
then? And so it goes in the UN.
Footnotes:
Some, including Haitians who had traveled to New York in good faith for
the conference, could not get in. A misleading UN web site allowed
people to register and even receive confirmation. They appeared prior
to the conference but were told another step had been needed, and that
the event was "for donors."
This contrasted to Bill Clinton's statement, following his high
security hobnobbing with Coca-Cola which has tried to brand the
earthquake, that the conference "heard from Haitian civilian
society, and not just from me."
Inner City Press also questioned the IMF's Dominique
Strauss-Kahn at
the stakeout, on the IMF's failure to yet forgive Haiti's debt, in
contrast to the IADB. After reporting
Strauss-Kahn's answer
yesterday, Thursday morning Inner City Press asked for more detail
at
the IMF's bi-weekly briefing, on this it will report before the IMF's
10:30 a.m. embargo time. Watch this site.
, 
