UN
Declares War
in Congo Via
Official Left
Nameless by
AFP, Reuters
& BBC
By
Matthew
Russell Lee
UNITED
NATIONS,
January 26 --
Should UN
officials be
allowed to
declare war
anonymously?
Today
Reuters
from the UN
in New York
runs a quote
that "'It is
not
simply
peacekeeping,
this
is peace
enforcement.
It's a much
more
robust
stance,' said
the official,
who declined
to be named."
Why
did Reuters
accept this
request for
anonymity from
a UN official
on a
concept --
"peace
enforcement"
-- that not
all UN member
states,
particularly
troop
contributing
countries,
have agreed
to?
BBC
has the same
blind quotes,
without
explaining or
even
mentioning
that
the UN
official
declined to be
named.
Agence
France Presse
goes further,
or lower,
allowing a
"second
UN official"
to also go
unnamed.
After
the UN failed
in the
Democratic
Republic of
Congo to
protect
civilians
first in Goma
then in
Minova, where
the DRC Army raped
at
least 126
women in late
November 2012,
a reserve spin
war began.
UN
Peacekeeping
chief Herve
Ladsous
refused to
answer Press
questions
about the
Minova rapes,
instead taking
favored and
compliant
media
out into the
hall for a
private
briefing. Video here. These media
included
Reuters,
Agence
France-Presse
and Voice of
America.
Now
it's gotten
worse. On
January 25,
2013 AFP,
Reuters
and the BBC
at the UN
allowed an
"unnamed UN
official" to
essentially
declare war
in the Congo.
Why grant
anonymity? Is
this a
whistleblower?
Or a
failing UN
official?
On
the media,
what are the
policies on
granting
anonymity in
cases like
this for
Reuters
editors like Stephen J. Adler, Walden
Siew, and
Paul
Ingrassia,
for Agence
France
Presse, for
BBC?
In
terms of the
UN, isn't
this
"inter-governmental
organization"
owned and
supposedly by
its member
states? Many
of them,
particularly
troop
contributing
countries,
have not
agreed to
Ladsous'
"peace
enforcement"
push, nor in
the C-34
committee on
peacekeeping
have they
signed off on
his proposal
to use drones.
But
Ladsous, Inner
City Press yesterday
reported, ran
a procurement
for
drones from
November 28,
2012 to
January 11,
2013,
before he had
any
approval at
all. Another
UN official in
the mix is
Susana
Malcorra, sent to the
region as
the Personal
Envoy of Secretary
General
Ban Ki-moon.
But Malcorra
promised to be
more
transparent,
after
defending the
UN's
blacking out
of material
about war
crimes.
We'll see.
What
right do high
UN official
have to
declare war
anonymously?
And why
do AFP,
Reuters and
the BBC serve
as pass
throughs in
this way?
Of
note in this
is the role of
the decaying
UN
Correspondents
Association.
When Ladsous
became the
last minute
replacement
for
Jerome
Bonnafont
as France's
official to
succeed their
own Alain Le
Roy atop UN
Peacekeeping
and Inner City
Press reported
it, AFP's Tim
Witcher
launched a
process in
UNCA to "take
action"
against
Inner City
Press.
He, the BBC
reporter and
Reuters are
all on the
Executive
Committee on
UNCA, two
elected
without any
competition
after their
terms expired.
Ultimately
he
and Louis
Charbonneau
of Reuters
supported Voice of
America's June
20, 2012
request to
the UN that
Inner City
Press accreditation
be
"reviewed."
This led the New
York Civil
Liberties
Union to ask
public
questions
about due
process for
independent
journalists at
the UN,
questions that
the UN
has yet to
answer.
Then in
December 2012
when Ladsous
went so far
as to have his
spokesman seize
the UNTV
microphone
so Inner City
Press could
not ask
Ladsous a
question about
the now 126
rapes in
Minova by the
UN's partners
in the
Congolese
Army, UNCA did
nothing. Video
here.
UN
official
Stephane
Dujarric
claims he told
Ladsous'
spokesman not
to
do it again --
but never told
anyone until a
January
17 meeting
when
he and another
UN official, Peter
Launsky-Tieffenthal (we
name
officials)
were Pressed
by the new Free UN Coalition for Access on the
UN's further
decline in
transparency.
But
now this UN
machinery and
its servile
press allow a
UN official to
declare war
anonymously. A
new low has
been reached.
Could they go
lower? Watch
this site.
, 
