Inner City Press

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

These reports are usually available through Google News and on Lexis-Nexis

Google
  Search innercitypress.com Search WWW (censored?)

In Other Media-eg AJE, FP, Georgia, NYT Azerbaijan, CSM Click here to contact us     .

,



Follow us on TWITTER

Home -

These reports are usually available through Google News and on Lexis-Nexis

CONTRIBUTE

RSS

ICP on YouTube

BloggingHeads.tv

UN: Sri Lanka

VoA: NYCLU

FOIA Finds  

Google, Asked at UN About Censorship, Moved to Censor the Questioner, Sources Say, Blaming UN - Update - Editorial

Support this work by buying this book

Click on cover for secure site orders

also includes "Toxic Credit in the Global Inner City"
 

 

 


Community
Reinvestment

Bank Beat

Freedom of Information
 

How to Contact Us



After Calling Haiti IDPs Promiscuous, OCHA Tells ICP It was Translation Error

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, January 7, updated -- The UN makes mistakes both large and small, but often does not fix them or even try. Sometimes the opposite is true.

  UN Peacekeeping fled Rwanda in 1994 while 800,000 were killed; the French helped the genocidaires escape to Goma and environs. Now Herve Ladsous a French diplomat who defended this is in charge of UN peacekeeping, and refuses to answer Press questions about his partners' rapes outside of Goma. Video here.

  This is another story, though, about other part of the UN: the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs.

  When Inner City Press noticed that OCHA's report on Haiti cited "promiscuity" in the camps for Internally Displaced People, it raised the issue on the Internet, tweeting at OCHA chief Valerie Amos then OCHA itself.

  Just before 10 am on Monday, OCHA tweeted back: "@innercitypress @ValerieAmos -- Thanks for highlighting translation error. Revised report will be up shortly."

While it remains to be seen what French word was used and "mistranslated" as promiscuity, it's notable that OCHA unlike the Department of Peacekeeping Operations responded to the question, even online, and acknowledged an error.

The UN won't acknowledge its role in bringing cholera to Haiti; in the Congo, DPKO ended up claiming it had done a good job in Goma, even as it did nothing as the M23 mutineers took it over.

Now Ladsous has three times on camera refused to answer questions about at least 126 rapes in Minova by the Congolese Army, which his DPKO supports. It's becoming too late to admit error. Watch this site.

Update of 11:08 am -- OCHA by tweet at Inner City Press explains:

  We note for what it's worth that Google Translate leads with "promiscuity" as the translation, with "overcrowding" third. But OCHA to DPKO, there is no comparison. There should, however, be action on DPKO. Watch this site.

Share |

* * *

These reports are usually also available through Google News and on Lexis-Nexis.

Click here for Sept 26, 2011 New Yorker on Inner City Press at UN

Click for  BloggingHeads.tv re Libya, Sri Lanka, UN Corruption

Feedback: Editorial [at] innercitypress.com

UN Office: S-253, UN, NY 10017 USA Tel: 212-963-1439

Reporter's mobile (and weekends): 718-716-3540

Google
  Search innercitypress.com  Search WWW (censored?)

Other, earlier Inner City Press are listed here, and some are available in the ProQuest service, and now on Lexis-Nexis.

            Copyright 2006-2013 Inner City Press, Inc. To request reprint or other permission, e-contact Editorial [at] innercitypress.com