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

At UN, Nepal Opposition Letter Delayed & Ignored, Landgren to Burundi

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, January 5 -- Two weeks before the mandate of the UN Mission in Nepal was set to expire, UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon named UNMIN chief Karin Landgren as his representative to Burundi.

This telegraphed that the UN would ignore the plea by the Nepali opposition that the UN stay on. On January 3, Inner City Press e-mailed Ms. Landgren some simple questions, asking her

“to state your current role in Burundi. Charles Petrie told me he was leaving November 1, then December 31. Are you currently handling both Nepal and Burundi? Who is currently in charge of UNMIN? And when will you arrive in Burundi? Who is in charge there right now?”

There was no answer, so Inner City Press sought to ask the question at the UN's noon briefing on January 4. Ban Ki-moon's spokesman Martin Nesirky pointedly did not allow the question, walking about of the room.

On January 5, Inner City Press again tried to ask Nesirky, finally blurting out, “Why did Ban Ki-moon move Karin Landgren to Burundi?” Nesirky again refused to answer, using the time instead to say that the Security Council was meeting about Nepal later in the day, and claiming that there was no time for him to answer, since the Bosnian president of the Council was about to begin. (The Bosnian briefing did not start for at least another ten minutes).

  Nevertheless, after the repeated refusal to answer the Nepal questions, Nesirky's office sent this:

From: UN Spokesperson - Do Not Reply [at] un.org
Date: Wed, Jan 5, 2011 at 12:55 PM
Subject: Your question on Karin Landgren
To: Inner City Press

Ms. Karin Landgren was named by the Secretary-General on 31st December to be the new SRSG in Burundi. She remains currently in charge of our mission in Nepal, UNMIN, and will continue there through the scheduled end of its mandate on 15 January. She will take up responsibilities in Burundi soon thereafter. Mr. Charles Petrie left Burundi on 26 December. Until the arrival of Ms. Landgren, the Chief of Staff of BINUB in Bujumbura has been designated as Officer in Charge.

The question remains, why so publicly pull Landgren from Nepal even as the opposition was calling for the UN to stay, and writing to the Security Council to make that request?

  While Nesirky's Office told Inner City Press that the letter was received on January 3, on January 4 a Permanent Five member of the Council's Permanent Representative told Inner City Press that the letter had not been circulated. That took place on the morning of January 5. When Inner City Press asked this month's Council president about the letter at the stakeout, after he read a short press statement, the President refused to answer. Video here.

Landgren in the Council, soon to be on Burundi, shallow bench not shown

It appears that because Charles Petrie was leaving Burundi on December 26 -- after quitting on November 1 -- the UN felt a need to name a replacement as of December 31. This reflects, using a sports team metaphor,  how shallow the UN's bench of diplomats is: there was apparently no one else to take over in Burundi.  Watch this site.

Footnote: India's ambassador, on his way into the Council on January 4, told Inner City Press that UNMIS was "over... wind up." The Council President told Inner City Press on January 5 that most on the Council thought the Mission should end. Another Council diplomat explained: for five years, no progress, but they kept asking us to stay. Now we are leaving. "Good riddance."