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

On Sudan Elections, Susan Rice Explains Gration, UN Silent, Paid "Rebel" Leader

UNITED NATIONS, April 8 -- As questions mount about both the Sudanese elections and the Obama administration's seeming two positions on them, U.S. Ambassador to the UN Susan Rice on Thursday took two such questions from the Press. While the UN has in public been very quiet about doubts about the election, Ambassador Rice said that in closed door consultation, the head of UN Peacekeeping Alain Leroy described

"serious government restrictions on political freedom, freedom of speech, freedom of association, the opportunity for all political actors to campaign without impediment, harassment of the media, limitations on access to polling stations for many of the people of Sudan, in particular in Darfur."

  As Inner City Press has reported on for weeks, these are not things that the UN says in public. Tellingly, despite a promise that Alain Leroy would take questions from the Press after the consultations, his appearance was canceled.*

  Council President Yukio Takasu emerged to paint a more positive picture of the "historic" developments in Sudan, and to say that any questions should be directed to Alain Leroy, who did not come and is leaving for ten days leave, sources say.

  Inner City Press asked Ambassador Rice to explain the rosier outlook of the US envoy to Sudan:

Inner City Press: Scott Gration has said that he thought the elections would be as free and fair as possible, can you explain, I guess, what that means, whether that is being kind of retracted in light of what you said? Do you think that the UN, both UNAMID and UNMIS should be more, they said very little about as these events are taking place at least publicly, what is their role for trying to secure a free and fair election without incident?

Ambassador Rice: With respect to the characterization of the elections, I think as we heard from Undersecretary-General Le Roy this morning, and as we have said repeatedly at this mike and various other places, the trends are not encouraging. There have been some significant impediments on the ground, restrictions on civil liberties, harassment of the media, reduction in the number of polling places, insecurity, an inability, of many of the people, particularly in Darfur, to be able to register and participate. So, we have overtime expressed our concerns, those concerns are mounting as the election approaches, and we are certainly underscoring the importance of steps being taken immediately to try to mitigate, to the greatest extent possible, in the time that remains, these very serious infringements on free political activity.

   To some, it sounded like an attempt to say that things have gotten worse since Gration predicted that elections will be "as free and fair as possible."

Susan Rice on April 8, Scott Gration (and Samantha Power) not shown
 
With Sudan's Ambassador saying the elections will proceed on April 11 -- he also said, "the war in Darfur is over" -- Inner City Press asked if the U.S. favors any delay, as requested by many Sudanese opposition groups.

Inner City Press: Should there be a delay?

Ambassador Rice: I think our view has been that if a very brief delay were decided to be necessary, and we thought that a brief delay would enable the process to be more credible, we would be prepared to entertain that. That's obviously up to the authorities themselves, but the larger picture is that much is awry in this process, and that is a real concern.

There are at least two approaches to Sudan within the Obama administration. To the side of the stakeout, Samantha "Problem from Hell" Power stood. Could there be three U.S. positions?

Footnote: Inner City Press also asked Sudan's Ambassador, and the UN, about the propriety of pro-government Darfur "rebel" leader Al-Tijani Al-Sissi having been paid by the UN until March 8, 2010, as exclusively exposed by Inner City Press.

  Sudan's Ambassador said that Al-Sissi is a "long time" rebel leader -- that is, before March 8, while paid by the UN. The UN Spokesperson's office has tried to refer all questions to Addis Ababa, where Al-Sissi worked. But it is a question that goes to the top of the UN. Inner City Press has submitted five questions and a deadline. Watch this site.

* -- Regarding DPKO's Leroy's cancelation, it was explained that he didn't want to speak if the Council president was speaking. But to his credit Leroy has done so in the past. And in this case, President Takasu said, "Ask Leroy." An attempt was made to get Leroy to come back to the stakeout -- they said he "had a lunch" -- but this did not happen. Leroy is usually open with the Press, making the failure of the UN to speak on Sudan elections, and on the Al-Sissi scandal, all the more noticeable.

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