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By Matthew Russell Lee, Patreon Video
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UN GATE, June 1–   With Albania taking over presidency of the UN Security Council on June 1, on May 31 Inner City Press wrote to the Albanian Mission to the UN to request access to its June 1 12:30 pm  press conference by Ambassador Ferit Hoxha. The Mission and its spokesperson Anila Ajvazi did not answer by 12:30. Inner City Press live tweeted here:

It begins: Now Albania PR  Hoxha intones about  Press Freedom  while his  Mission won't even answer written questions from Inner City Press (unlike the IMF, for example)

Ferit Hoxha is today servicing state media from China, Azerbaijan, Saudi  

Now  Albania Mission hands first question to Italian media, which again asks about... Italy.  Hoxha  says, Grazie! For the softball question? What is his answer about the recently data dumped cases of sex abuse by UN peacekeepers?

More parochial games -  Hoxha gives 3d question to, what else, a reporter in from Albania, to ask a softball qeustion about Kosovo. Ferit Hoxha is reading from notes. Can't take real Press questions?

Now the spokesperson, who has refused to answer Inner City Press' written questions from yesterday, hands a question to China state CCTV.  Hoxha has said nothing on China genocide against Uighurs, Bachelet's  whitewash trip

 Now yet another state media question picked by  spox for Hoxha : Turkey state media asks him about Turkey's "dispute" with Sweden and Finland joining NATO without arresting all Gulenists. None of Inner City Press' emailed questions have been answered.

In fairness - and because with or without any even handed treatment by Albania's Mission we will be covering the UNSC in June, here is their program of work, including Yemen (14th), Ukraine (6th), CAR (22nd), Mali (13the) and DRC (29th).

 Inner City Press wrote to the Albania Mission at mission.newyork at mfa.gov.al and  OfficeofthePR.Albania and mfa.gov.al and to its listed spokesman anila.ajvazi and mfa.gov.al, apparently MIA: "This is a timely request that you send Inner City Press the pass code(s) to access your UNSC Presidency press briefing on June 1, 2022. I have questions to ask on what you will do this month about the conflicts in Ukraine, Haiti, Sudan, DRC, Cameroon, Yemen and Libya - and on recent cases of sexual abuse and exploitatoin by UN peacekeepers on  Inner City Press first reported - Inner City Press is asking to be provided with access / the passwords to your Albania mission's stakeouts and press conferences this month as UNSC President...  I would also like to ask you to instruct MALU  / USG-DGC Melissa Fleming to allow me to enter to cover it, for Inner City Press. She has not responded to this letter (your Albania mission should)   Please immediately confirm receipt, and provide the passcode or state why not."

But by June 1 at 12:30 pm, nothing.

Inconsistent, to say the least, with Albania's duty as President of the UN Security Council.  Inner City Press covered the UN and UNSC under Kofi Annan and Ban Ki-moon then was thrown out under Antonio Guterres after asking him directly about [, among other things including Cameroon,] the omission from his financial disclosure covering 2016 of his link, through Lisbon's Gulbenkian Foundation which paid him money, to convicted UN briber CEFC China Energy.

This was and is a legitimate journalistic question however Inner City Press has been banned by Guterres and his USG Melissa Fleming. 

There is no commitment by the UN Secretariat to even respond to a polite law firm letter seeking access to Inner City Press, see video. See also Press Freedom Tracker and The Independent (UK)

The Albanian Mission and Albania have a duty to not collude in censorship, and to take questions from media. Inner City Press is permitted (in fact, invited) to put WebEx questions to the IMF briefings, see below, and is accredited at the SDNY Federal court here in New York. 

So it is up to Albania and the Albanian Mission to provide access.

Watch this site. 

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