By
Matthew
Russell Lee
UNITED
NATIONS, July
31 -- When the
UN's Working
Group on the
Use of
Mercenaries
held a panel
discussion
Wednesday
morning, listing
forty minutes
of questions
and answers,
it was assumed
that for
example the
UN's use of
armed guards
in Somalia, so
far left
murky,
could be
clarified.
But
the Q&A
was devoted
only to member
states, mostly
for speeches.
From the
podium, it was
claimed that
all of the
UN's uses of
armed
guards must
comply with
international
law. Why then
won't
the UN
Department of
Peacekeeping
Operations
under Herve
Ladsous answer
if
the Geneva
Conventions
apply to its
impending
offensive in
the
Eastern Congo?
Rick
Cottom of
various UN
staff unions
said that in
his
experience, UN
Security would
rather be the
one in the
field, not
paid
outsiders.
Lou
Pingeot of
Global Policy
Forum asked
why the UN
Peacekeeping
location
in Valencia,
Spain (the
lawless
establishment
before its
General
Assembly
approval Inner
City Press
covered at the
time) uses
outside armed
security, and
noted UN
Peacekeeping's
use of Saracen
in the
Democratic
Republic of
the Congo.
Saracen
is
now repackaged
as "Sterling,"
as noted in
the most
recently
Somalia
Eritrea
Monitoring
Group report.
In Somalia, as
Inner City
Press reported,
David Bax of
the UN Mine
Action Service
is
said to
provide
information to
US
intelligence
through the
shadowy
PMSC Bancroft
Global.
Bax has been
photographed
tooling around
Mogadishu with
armed guards.
The
UN's
Nicholas Kay
acknowledged
to Inner City
Press that "some of
our guards are
armed."
How many? From
which company?
Denel?
Where is the
transparency?
We will pursue
this.
But
Wednesday
morning the
interventions
were all from
member states.
Indonesia
spoke of being
part of the
Syria observer
mission killed
off by Herve
Ladsous. The Free UN Coalition for Access believes
minimal
transparency
requires
disclosing who
can ask
questions,
raised here.
Watch this
site.
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