Inner City Press
Global Inner Cities Report - March 7, 2006
UN Reform: Transparency Later, Not
Now -- At Least Not for AXA - WFP Insurance Contract
Byline: Matthew
Russell Lee, Inner City Press U.N. Correspondent
UNITED NATIONS, March 7 -- A plan for
management reform of the United Nations system was presented Tuesday to the
General Assembly, including a proposal for outsourcing of work and improvement
procurement procedures. A senior UN official who asked not to be named
emphasized that the UN currently spends only $20,000 a year to train its 70
procurement staffers; the proposal would raise that figure to $10,00,000. It's
unclear whether that training would extend to entities like the UN's World Food
Programme, which on March 6 announced a $930,000 contract with the French
financial services company AXA Re, to insure against drought in Ethiopia.
At an on-the-record briefing Tuesday afternoon,
Inner City Press asked how AXA had been selected for this contract. It has been
reported that there were four other bidders, left unnamed. Inner City Press was
referred to WFP's New York based spokesman, who said he didn't know who else bid
for the contract, and said that "if you are suggesting that there's something
inappropriate, you're barking up the wrong tree."
To ask for information about a
near-million dollar contract is not to suggest anything. Among the questions:
while it was initially said that the selected insurer would pay out $15 to $20
million in the event of drought, the AXA contract calls for a $7.1 payment. To
ask for an explanation of the difference is not to cast aspersions. But there is
a climate of paranoia and defensiveness these days at the UN, at least in New
York. Inner City Press immediately emailed written questions to the WFP in Rome
and to Richard Wilcox, the WFP's Business Planning Director, who was asked what
screening procedures the WFP uses in procurement. (As simply one example or
question, AXA founder Claude Bebear and its CEO Henri de Castries have been
caught up in a money laundering investigation, the point being not the outcome
but the WFP's procedures). At press time, only the following was received:
-----Original
Message-----
From: Senior
Public Affairs Officer, World Food Programme
To:
innercitypress.com
Sent: Tue, 7
Mar 2006 20:08:05 +0100
Subject: Re:
Press inquiry
"AXA won the
contract with WFP through a competitive international tender. Five re-insurance
companies bid for the contract, and AXA was chosen on the basis of price and
technical competence. I'm afraid I don't have the details of the other four
bidders, and while we publish the winners of tenders, we don't make the bids
themselves public."
Not even the names of the bidders?
The Secretary General's March 7 reform proposal states, at page 28, that "in May
2006, I shall submit... a detailed policy proposal containing new and clear
rules on public access to United Nations documentation." That will or would be
not a moment too soon.
Leaving
Ethiopia
Also at the UN headquarters on Tuesday,
ex-Knicks player John Starks spoke in advance of a March 15 event scheduled
Madison Square Garden, Dunk Malaria. The sponsor is Hedge Funds Versus Malaria,
whose founder Lance Laifer also spoke, along with the UN's Djibril Diallo
(himself a malaria survivor, from Senegal). When asked by Inner City Press which
hedge funds are involved, Mr. Laifer mentioned several including his own
(Hilltop Partners), and Seneca Capital. He agreed that recruiting the area's
other (more winning) team, the (Bed) Nets, makes sense. A Knicks representative
said that the wider NBA will be involved, and that the NBA wanted to attend but
was focused Tuesday on the first sporting event in New Orleans since Hurricane
Katrina. The press release, reiterated by public address system five minutes
before the event, said Alan Houston would be there. John Starks filled in ably,
even joking that he'd better dunk carefully, given his shooting percentage...
Empty Words on Money Laundering and Narcotics, from the UN, Georgia and
Equatorial Guinea
Byline:
Matthew Russell Lee, Inner City Press U.N. Correspondent
UNITED NATIONS, Feb.
28 – The International Narcotics Control Board released its 2005 annual report
on Tuesday, during an embargoed briefing by retired U.S. diplomat and Board
member Melvyn Levitsky. Asked by Inner City Press if the Board has taken a
position on statements about coca by Bolivia’s new president Evo Morales, Mr.
Levitsky responded that while the report ends with November 2005, Bolivia is a
signatory to treaties that cover coca, and that the twenty five year opt-out for
medical uses is not applicable. Mr. Levitsky confirmed that opium production in
Afghanistan has increased since 2001, and ascribed this to areas of the country
being outside of government control. The question arose, if the military
firepower currently supporting the government of Hamid Karzai can’t or won’t
turn the tide on opium production, it will be difficult to see anti-drug goals
of the Board realized.
Earlier
in the briefing Mr. Levitsky had said that Afghan production is moving through
Iran and “Russia;” asked to clarify, he said trafficking would have to move
through the “former Soviet republics” of Central Asia in order to get to Russia.
The report, in its 552nd paragraph on page 79, states
that “Turkmenistan, whose extensive borders with Afghanistan, the Islamic
Republic of Iran, Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan are inadequately controlled,
continues to be used as a transit country by trackers of Afghan opiates.”
Also
reported, but not connected, is the Board’s note a page earlier that “current
legislation in Armenia, Georgia and Turkmenistan is insufficient to deal with
the problem of money laundering; the Board urges the Governments of those
countries to remedy the situation without delay.”
Interviewed
after the briefing by Inner City Press, Mr. Levitsky said that money laundering
is not in the mandate of the International Narcotics Control Board. “We don’t
have a section that monitors flows,” he said. Asked if the Board provides
narcotic-specific information to the Financial Action Task Force, Mr.Levitsky
shook his head and mentioned changes in Swiss and even Russian banking secrecy
laws, but nothing about Turkmenistan, much less Georgia.
Georgia’s
permanent representative to the UN, Revaz Adamia, confirmed in a Feb. 1 press
briefing quotes by National Bank of Georgia president Roman Gotsiridze regarding
Russian banks money laundering in Abkhazia. Mr. Adamia spoke of money
laundering for “terrorism,” and said that he would more get more specifics from
the National Bank of Georgia. While such information has yet to be provided, in
Tbilisi Mr. Gotsiridze has said more, being quoted in a Rustavi-2 TV report on
February 23 that
“The National Bank has asked the FATF to
examine illegal activities of Russian commercial banks in Abkhazia. Here is a
list of the Russian commercial banks that have been illegally operating in
Abkhazia and laundering massive amounts of black money. It is not ruled out that
there may be even more serious violations, for example financing of terrorism,
going on in this uncontrolled area. Banks operating in Abkhazia are illegal and
unlicensed banking establishments. The Russian legislation itself prohibits any
economic relations with unlicensed organizations.”
Inner
City Press on Feb. 28 posed written questions to Georgia’s mission to the UN;
the questions were not responded to by deadline.
Footnote on a footnote: The report states that “Equatorial Guinea remains the
only State in Africa that is not yet a party to any of the three main
international drug control treaties” (page 42). The Secretary-General on Feb. 27
met with the long-time president of Equatorial Guinea, Teodoro Obiang Nguema
Mbasogo, and afterwards
hailed him. One wonders if the topics of money laundering came up...
On the Web: http://www.incb.org/incb/en/annual_report.html
A related previous
Inner City Press report --
Abkhazia: Cleansing and
(Money) Laundering, Says Georgia, Even Terror’s Haven
Byline:
Matthew Russell Lee, Inner City Press U.N. Correspondent
UNITED NATIONS, Feb. 1 -- The situation in
Abkhazia should be internationalized, said Georgia’s ambassador to the
United Nations, Revaz Adamia, on February 1. Briefing reporters at the
UN Headquarters, Mr. Adamia characterized the plight of ethnic Georgians
in Abkhazia as one of ethnic cleansing and even genocide. He cited a
figure of 10,000 dead (as well as 100 Russian soldiers killed). His
prepared remarks referred to “de facto annexation” and that “acquisition
of property in the conflict zones, including property of refugees and
IDPs, by the Russian entities is underway at full steam.”
As Inner City Press reported in
December, the President of Georgia's National Bank Roman Gotsiridze has
accused Russian banks in Abkhazia of money laundering and of financing
terrorism. At the Feb. 1 UN briefing, Mr. Adamia responded to
questioning by reiterating the allegation, and specifying that the
perpetrator of particular terror attacks in Turkey is living in
Abkhazia, “he has a shelter there.” Mr. Adamia promised to provide Inner
City Press with further information and evidence; watch this space.
On January 31, the
Security Council
extended
the UN Observer
Mission in Georgia (UNOMIG) until March 31. The mission consists of 122
military observers and 13 civilian police officers.
After the
briefing, in an interview with Inner City Press, Ambassador Adamia
provided an update on the Baku-Tblisi-Ceyhan pipeline. He stated that
the Georgian section pipe is full of oil, but that this is not yet the
case in Turkey. He stated that Turkmenistan wants to use the BTC
pipeline, but that the Kremlin for now is blocking it. This, Adamia
said, makes more likely the construction of an underwater trans-Caspian
pipeline. Pipe dream? Rose (revolution) colored glasses? Only time will
tell.
Other Inner City Press
reports are archived on
www.InnerCityPress.org -
In Locked Down
Iraq, Oil Flows Unmetered While Questions Run in Circles
What is the Sound
of Eleven Uzbeks Disappearing? A Lack of Seats in Tashkent, a Turf War
at UN
Kosovo: Of
Collective Punishment and Electricity; Lights Out on Privatization of
Ferronikeli Mines
Abkhazia:
Cleansing and (Money) Laundering, Says Georgia, Even Terror’s Haven
Post-Tsunami
Human Rights Abuses, including by UNDP in the Maldives
Halliburton
Repays $9 Million, While Iraq’s Oil Remains Unmetered
Darfur on the
Margins: Slovenia’s President Drnovsek’s Quixotic Call for Action
Ignored
Who Pays for the
Global Bird Flu Fight? Not the Corporations, So Far - UN
Citigroup
Dissembles at United Nations Environmental Conference
Other Inner City Press
reports are archived on
www.InnerCityPress.org -
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