At UN,
After
Fliers
Question
Rights &
UNCA
Censorship,
They
Face Removal
By
Matthew
Russell Lee
UNITED
NATIONS,
January 24 --
Is there free
speech at the
UN? Not
really.
The
most recent
example is
that after the
Free UN
Coalition for
Access
posted
substantive
fliers, most
recently
Wednesday
night about UN
official
Stephane
Dujarric's
refusal to
disclose the
UN's policy on
due process
for reporters,
the UN late
Thursday
announced that
all
"un-approved"
fliers will be
removed over
this coming
weekend.
The
issue here is
that the UN
Correspondents
Association,
which in 2012
sought to get
the UN to
throw the
investigative
press out of
the UN,
has a large
glassed in
bulletin board
on the UN's
media floor.
For
months in 2012
they used this
board to
display a
letter
denouncing
Inner City
Press.
Does
this new UN
policy apply
to UNCA's
denunciation
board? Or only
to
attempts to
take public
issue with
UNCA?
Since
FUNCA was
launched on
December 7 it
has raised to
the top of the
UN
Department of
Public
Information
that there
must be space
for other
press
organizations
beyond UNCA,
given UNCA's
role in trying
to expel
other
journalists
and being
used, as
revealed, by
particular
countries'
missions to
the UN.
Freedom of
Information
Act requests
to Voice of
America have
revealed the UNCA
"met with UN
officials
(very
quietly)" to
discuss
dis-accrediting
Inner City
Press.
VOA
filed a June
20, 2012
request with
the UN's
Dujarric,
for which Dujarric
thanked VOA's
Steve Redisch.
VOA says it
had the
support of Louis
Charbonneau
of Reuters
and Tim
Witcher of
Agence
France-Presse.
These FOIA
documents have
been mentioned
in the fliers,
which now face
removal.
But
the January 24
directive of
DPI's Media
Accreditation
and Liaison
Unit is
contrary to
free speech
and to the
right of
reply.
The
Free UN
Coalition for
Access' fliers
have been
posted only in
the Dag
Hammarskhold
Library
building,
where the UN
moved the
press corps
during the $2
billion
renovation of
the UN. They
have been
placed
where UNCA had
its posters.
UNCA
first
responded to
the FUNCA
fliers by
defacing them
with slogans
like "Looney
Club." Then
they tore them
down. Then
they
posted
counterfeit
fliers, the
most recent on
January 24
trying to
link Inner
City Press to
disgraced
journalist
Jayson Blair.
But
Jayson Blair,
who made up
stories,
worked for and
was published
in
the New York
Times. And
others of the
big media
represented on
the
UNCA Executive
Committee have
had, let's
say, issues
with accuracy.
The
issue to this
is that UNCA
believes it
can dictate
content to
journalists at
the UN. In
2012, members
of the UNCA
Executive
Committee told
Inner City
Press to take
down articles
and photos or
"face the
consequences."
Now
it appears
that UNCA,
perhaps at the
behest of some
in the UN
hierarchy as
has happened
before, wants
to take down
fliers. But
then
shouldn't
their glassed
in bulletin
board, which
they have used
to
denounce other
journalists,
also come
down?
And
what kind of
"correspondents
association"
pushes, as
they
did with a
blurry copy of
the MALU
rules, to
silence others
from
expressing
substantive
opinions?
Watch this
site -- and if
you can,
the walls.
, 
