|
EU
Attacks UN Tax and Cyberspace
Authority Proposal, D'Escoto Advisers Muse
Byline: Matthew Russell Lee
of
Inner City Press at the UN: News Analysis
UNITED NATIONS, May 15
-- Faced with the global financial crisis, the
Sandinista, former and current Nicaraguan President of the UN General
Assembly
Miguel d'Escoto Brockman has convened a GA session for June 1, and
released his
own draft outcome document which proposes a UN Taxation Authority
and body to
regulate cyberspace.
"This is a subject I
don't
have any expertise on," d'Escoto said when Inner City Press asked.
Video
here from Minute 7:25. The European Union, Inner
City Press has learned, has written to d'Escoto in protest of his
draft, which
they say ignores a text that was being negotiated.
Two d'Escoto advisers held a press conference on the
topic on May 14,
but instead of addressing the controversy, Michael Clark held forth at
length
on his ideas of the end of money. As Inner City Press confirmed during
Clark's
May 1 press conference -- video here from Minute 26:24 -- Clark
previously served the U.S. Chamber of
Commerce, and then lobbied for U.S. companies to get more business in
India, in
the U.S. - India Business Council. So did he believe in what he was
doing then,
or now? Apparently it's been an evolution.
While the May 14 press conference lasted an hour, it
was organized in
such a way that not all questions, including one on the European Union
letter,
could be asked.
UN's Ban and D'Escoto, taxation and cyberspace and
answers not shown
Some in the press corps think that d'Escoto
is over-briefing
about this financial session. But his Office is not even answering the
obvious
questions. The main spokesman for d'Escoto is away, which may explain
it.
Previously, Inner City Press has asked his office for d'Escoto's view
on carbon
offsetting his travel around the world, without receiving an answer.
D'Escoto himself seems a nice and gentle man. After
his press conference
-- at the most recent of which he took only three questions, refusing
one about
the contentious UN Gaza report -- journalists descend on him like
locusts for,
as one put it, "crazy quotes." Now security officers surrounded
d'Escoto as he moves gingerly off the podium. It is all coming to a
head: Watch
this site.
Footnote
/ analysis: clearly, there is a need to re-think the
under-regulation of finance. But grandstanding and pontificating, and
ignoring
major blocs drafts of document and then refusing to take questions,
seems
unlikely to be effective. There are still two weeks to be more
effective. Given the importance of the topic, here's hoping.
On Sri Lanka
On Friday
May 8, Inner City Press asked Deputy
Spokesperson Okabe:
Inner
City Press: On the invitation by the Government of Sri Lanka to the
Secretary-General to visit, is there any progress in thinking? In
the alternative, is the Secretary-General, is he considering invoking
Article 99 or responsibility to protect or making some other move of
some type on the situation in Sri Lanka?
Deputy
Spokesperson: I have nothing beyond what we’ve been saying from
this podium this week on Sri Lanka, including what the
Secretary-General himself has said earlier this week.
What Ban said
did not involve calling for a cease-fire, did not respond to the
invitation to visit Sri Lanka, or the accelerating rate of civilians
death over the weekend, during which no statement issued about Sri
Lanka. Watch this site.
Channel
4 in the UK with allegations of rape and
disappearance
Click here
for an Inner City Press YouTube channel video, mostly UN Headquarters
footage, about civilian
deaths
in Sri Lanka.
Click here for Inner City
Press' March 27 UN debate
Click here for Inner City
Press March 12 UN (and AIG
bailout) debate
Click here for Inner City
Press' Feb 26 UN debate
Click
here
for Feb.
12 debate on Sri Lanka http://bloggingheads.tv/diavlogs/17772?in=11:33&out=32:56
Click here for Inner City Press' Jan.
16, 2009 debate about Gaza
Click here for Inner City Press'
review-of-2008 UN Top Ten debate
Click here for Inner
City Press' December 24 debate on UN budget, Niger
Click here from Inner City Press'
December 12 debate on UN double standards
Click here for Inner
City Press' November 25 debate on Somalia, politics
and this October 17 debate, on
Security Council and Obama and the UN.
* * *
These
reports are
usually also available through Google
News and on Lexis-Nexis.
Click here
for a Reuters
AlertNet piece by this correspondent
about Uganda's Lord's Resistance Army. Click
here
for an earlier Reuters AlertNet piece about the Somali
National
Reconciliation Congress, and the UN's $200,000 contribution from an
undefined trust fund. Video
Analysis here
Feedback: Editorial
[at] innercitypress.com
UN
Office: S-453A, UN, NY 10017
USA
Tel: 212-963-1439
Reporter's
mobile (and
weekends):
718-716-3540
Other,
earlier Inner City Press are listed here, and some are available
in the ProQuest service, and now on Lexis-Nexis.
Copyright
2006-08 Inner City Press, Inc. To request
reprint or other permission, e-contact Editorial [at]
innercitypress.com -
|
, 
