As
UNDP
Brags of
Debris Removal
in
Philippines,
Failed in
Haiti, Of
Relocation
By
Matthew
Russell Lee
UNITED
NATIONS,
December 2 --
While the UN
promotes its
response to Typhoon
Haiyan in the
Philippines,
including
debris removal
by the UN
Development
Program, Inner
City Press on
Monday asked
UNDP's
Haoliang
Xu what the UN
learned from
its failures
in cash for
work debris
removal after
the earthquake
in Haiti.
Xu
said he didn't
know much
about Haiti,
but experts
from Aceh were
being sent to
the
Philippines.
He spoke about
recycling
downed
coconut trees.
During
the UN's
last
headquarters
press
conference
about its
response to
the
typhoon,
Inner City
Press asked UN
Office for the
Coordination
of
Humanitarian
Affairs chief
Valerie Amos
about OCHA
identifying as
a
constraint
that "no
legislative
decision has
yet been made
on
alternative
re-settlement
or re-location
arrangements,
or on response
to movements
of people."
When
Inner City
Press asked
the UNDP's Xu
about this, he
called it
"sensitive"
and said that
a "Post
Disaster Needs
Assessment
Exercise"
would be
finished by
January, and
used by
the government
in its future
plans.
On
the debris
removal,
UNDP's Xu said
workers will
be
vaccinated...
for
tetnus. UN
Peacekeeping
neither
screened nor
vaccinated for
cholera
the soldiers
it brought to
Haiti from
Nepal.
Footnote:
The
automatic
first
questioner,
Pamela Falk of
CBS speaking
for the
United Nations
Correspondents
Association --
which some
correspondents
call the UN's
Censorship
Alliance
-- mentioned
cholera, but
not Haiti. She
was most
fixated on
tourism in the
Philippines
(one wonders
if CBS will
actually cover
this, or it
was
just a
question asked
for the sake
of demanding
the first
question).
Xu to his
credit said it
is not the
time for
tourism in
Tacloban.
Tell it to the
censors: this
is their month
of champagne.
Watch this
site.
, 
