UNITED
NATIONS, April
26 -- For two
days in a row,
Inner City
Press has
asked the UN
about New
Zealand
pulling its
personnel
serving with
the
UN out of
Syria and the
Golan “area of
responsibility”
and into
Israel.
And
still, the UN
has not
answered about
the pull-out,
even as it
promotes in
advance
Secretary
General Ban
Ki-moon's
Monday meeting
with his
chemical
weapons prober
Ake Sellstrom,
who Ban has
summoned
to fly to New
York, green
house gasses
notwithstanding.
On
April
25, Inner
City Press asked
Ban's
spokesman
Martin
Nesirky:
Inner
City Press: on
Syria, New
Zealand has
said that its
peacekeepers
on
UNDOF must
withdraw from,
they said,
Syria and only
be based in
Israel. Is
that the UN is
aware of and
what does it
portend for
UNDOF?
Spokesperson
Nesirky:
I’ll check on
precisely what
the picture is
there. UNDOF
has troop
contingents
and it also
has some staff
officers and
indeed
some civilians
who work in
smaller
numbers, of
course, than
the
actual troop
contingents
within UNDOF.
So let me
check on that
for
you. I don’t
have that at
hand right
now.
Twenty
four hours
later and
having
received no
answer (just
as it received
no
answer to its
question about
Ban meeting
former French
president
Nicolas
Sarkozy
despite the
meeting being
set for April
26, click
here for that),
Inner City
Press asked
again about
the New
Zealand
pull-out.
Video here,
from Minute
15: Can you
confirm
they've been
accommodated
and moved to
Israel?
Nesirky
said "they
belong to
UNSOA, they
are military
observers, I'm
trying
to ascertain
their precise
location at
this point,
they are in
the
area of
responsibility
of UNDOF."
Not
anymore: it's
reported
that “two Kiwi
peacekeepers,
who were both
working for
the United
Nations, were
shot at on the
Syrian side of
Golan Heights
last month.
They have
since been
moved to
Israel...The
security
scares have
prompted New
Zealand to
tell the UN
that it will
no longer
allow it's
peacekeepers
to stay in the
war-torn
nation due
to the
security
threat being
too high.”
So
New Zealand
told this to
the UN. But
even hours
after the
second,
April 26 noon
briefing, this
is what the UN
sent to Inner
City Press:
Subject:
Your
question on
Golan
From: UN
Spokesperson -
Do Not Reply
[at]
un.org
Date: Fri, Apr
26, 2013 at
3:42 PM
To:
Matthew.Lee
[at]
innercitypress.com
Cc: Martin
Nesirky [at]
un.org
We
can confirm
that there are
four military
observers from
New Zealand,
who are
members of the
UN Truce
Supervision
Organization
(UNTSO),
currently
serving in
Observer Group
Golan, which
is
operationally
integrated in
the UN
Disengagement
Observer Group
(UNDOF).
This
is only on the
bureaucracy, “
operationally
integrated”
into
Herve Ladsous'
UNDOF --
nothing about
New Zealand
ordering the
UN,
and the UN
agreeing, to
pull its
military
observers out
of Syria.
Why
play hide the
ball, while
hyping up Ake
Sellstrom's
flight to New
York on
Monday? Watch
this site.
, 
