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Sri Lanka Kohona Used UNCA Charbonneau of HRW Al Arabiya AFP VOA Once Guterres Was Undermined

By Matthew Russell Lee, Patreon
BBC - Guardian UK - Honduras - CJR - PFT

UN GATE / SDNY COURT, June 22 – The increasing corruption of the United Nations under Secretary General Antonio Guterres, and of the UN Correspondents Association he works with to intimidate and then rough up and ban the investigative Press, has been made clear today in a statement by former Ambassador of Sri Lanka Palitha Kohona, who has been accused of war crimes in the White Flags Killings.  

 In an article he published today in Asia Tribune, Kohona writes / admits once Inner City Press (he says, "the blogger") "began undermining Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, we mounted a quiet campaign against him within the UN press corps itself... information from our own sources was made available to many members of the UN press corps with a view to impugning the credibility of the man. It took a while, but his bravado unraveled when he fell afoul of the President of the United Nations Correspondents Association (UNCA), Giampaolo Pioli, who commenced proceedings to take him to court. Then he began to spar with a number of respected journalists who were beginning to approach us... The UN proceeded to evict him from the room that he was occupying and eventually from the UN itself." See Guterres action, continued by Melissa Fleming, here.

  Who is Kohona referring to, as helping him? Well, as a first example - there are more - here's an article Inner City Press published at the time, with people who are still at the UN working with Guterres:

  The letter, signed by signed by Reuters' Louis Charbonneau, Talal Al-Haj of Al-Arabia, Margaret Besheer of Voice of America and Timothy Witcher of Agence France Presse, was to set up a "Board of Examination" to "investigate" Inner City Press with an eye to expelling it.

  But on June 3, a major government aligned newspaper in Sri Lanka, the Sunday Observer, quoted with approval the UNCA Executive Committee indictment of Inner City Press.

  The newspaper concluded that that "if the allegations against Lee are proven, the UN headquarters will be made out of bounds for him. If the harassment charges are proven he could face a jail term of up to six years."

 It also reports, citing "authoritative diplomatic sources," that

"The United Nations Correspondents’ Association (UNCA) has initiated an inquiry against Inner City Press correspondent Matthew Russell Lee who was operating from the UN Headquarters on his unethical and unprofessional behaviour, authoritative diplomatic sources told the Sunday Observer yesterday. The Executive Committee of the UNCA met on May 29 to discuss his conduct following many complaints received by the Association and voted 13 to one in favour of setting up a five-member board of examination.

Lee's unethical coverage in the Inner City Press dominated issues and sensitive affairs concerning Sri Lanka as well.

The meeting was attended by the President of UNCA Giampiolo Pioli and the Vice Presidents among others.

  Who might those "authoritative diplomatic sources" be? Who is this UNCA Executive Committee serving? The article is online at http://www.sundayobserver.lk/2012/06/03/new11.asp

  After publication of the article, Inner City Press wrote to each member of the UNCA Executive Committee with a copy of the article, formally asking them to disassociate themselves from and bring about the immediate cessation of this anti press freedom climate that has led to this article.

  None responded to this request in writing; only one gave so much as a phone call. Meanwhile as should have been or perhaps was foreseen by UNCA Executive Committee members, the anti Press flow is increasing.

  Click here for sample UNCA minutes released on the night of June 1 from behind Reuters' firewall. Beyond making clear that censorship of Inner City Press' Sri Lanka reporting has been a major focus of UNCA's leadership since at least September 2011, these minutes have material omissions, including that the complaint of Tim Witcher of AFP was about reporting on Ladsous, the fourth Frenchman in a row to head UN Peacekeeping.

  Witcher, at the behest of the French Mission to the UN, began the push against Inner City Press for its reporting that the Mission didn't know that its capital had switch to second choice Ladsous from Jerome Bonnafont, whose bragging he was getting the post was also exposd by Inner City Press. Ladsous then accepted Sri Lankan general (and alleged war criminal) Shavendra Silva as a Senior Adviser.

   So - a war criminal used UNCA to get Inner City Press thrown out of its UN work space and then the UN, for undermining Guterres (who was also questioned by Inner City Press about Cameroon, and undisclosed financial links with UN briber CEFC China Energy). These people are (war) criminals. We'll have more on this - for now, here's more from Kohona (he does not disclose that he paid UNCA's Pioli money) --

"he published a story headed, 'Fish balls (his term for Sri Lankan fish cutlets) and wine to tempt the journalists'. ... He was also known to exchange information with diplomats at very important missions, some of whom had excellent sources within Sri Lanka. He was also a useful tool to some to embarrass the former Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon. Subsequently, he began undermining Secretary-General Antonio Guterres.

But we mounted a quiet campaign against him within the UN press corps itself with a view to exposing him and even forcing him to reveal his financiers.  Information from our own sources was made available to many members of the UN press corps with a view to impugning the credibility of the man. It took a while, but his bravado unraveled when he fell afoul of the President of the United Nations Correspondents Association (UNCA), Giampaolo Pioli, who commenced proceedings to take him to court. Then he began to spar with a number of respected journalists who were beginning to approach us for information on the man.

Eventually, he clashed with the Alison Smale, UN Under-Secretary-General for Global Communications, who declared that Lee’s “conduct has consistently breached” the UN’s media guidelines and “does not meet the established professional standards required of all correspondents granted access to United Nations premises.” As a result, his accreditation to cover the UN was withdrawn consistent with the terms of the US – UN Head Quarters Agreement (Agreement Between the United Nations and the United States Regarding the Headquarters of the United Nations, Signed June 26, 1947, and Approved by the General Assembly October 31, 1947). The UN proceeded to evict him from the room that he was occupying and eventually from the UN itself." 

What will CPJ, David Kaye, RSF et al do? Watch this site.

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