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By Matthew Russell Lee & sources, Exclusive

UN GATE, Sept 26 – Inner City Press has been reporting on serious malfeasance by the French Audrey Azoulay administration at UNESCO in Paris, almost as bad as Antonio Guterres' corruption in and of the UN in New York. Almost - a fish rots from the head.

UNESCO, like the whole UN system under Antonio Guterres is falling apart in corruption. In recent years, Inner City Press has revealed the alarming situation of the Paris-based UN agency, headed by Frenchwoman Audrey Azoulay since 2017. Despite all the reports, in the absence of strong reactions from member states, only a few corrective actions have been taken.

It goes without saying that if the Director general had been from a developing country, Europeans and especially the Nordic countries would have severely criticized, even called for her dismissal as in other cases elsewhere in the UN system.

But Audrey Azoulay is French and UNESCO is based in France, so most of those who usually have something to say are content to remain silent.  However, in the corridors, at receptions and bilateral meetings, the criticisms are becoming increasingly vocal. They will only grow louder in the months to come, as Azoulay's mandate looms to its end and tongues will be loosened even more with the campaign for the next DG starting next year. 

This sense of urgency pushes Audrey Azoulay to make quick decisions leading to the appointment of more French people to UNESCO and, at the same time, to lock in the future of her close collaborators by finding them comfortable jobs outside her office so that they can continue to receive their fat salaries even after she leaves the post of director general. 

The latest moves include the ejection of the Director of the Bureau of Strategic Planning (BSP), Mr LeSaux, who was unceremoniously dismissed, although this was accompanied by a hefty compensation package to keep him quiet. The original arrangement discussed by Azoulay was to put her Director of Cabinet Nicolas Kassianides in the position, but ambassadors friendly to the Azoulay regime shared their concerns about this, pointing out that the position of BSP requires real intellectual capacity and institutional proficiencies, whereas Kassianides has none. Thus, instead of carbonizing him with such an appointment, she is in the process of finding another Frenchman for the job.

 Furthermore, the advisor to UNESCO's DG, Audrey Azoulay, Julien Ravalais-Casanova, who was involved in the French presidential campaign while working at UNESCO and receiving a UN salary paid by taxpayers is still working in this same BSP unit. Upon investigation, it turned out that Julien Ravalais-Casanova has been involved in several previous political campaigns before he moved into the apparatus of Zemmour's campaign as a political mercenary changing his focus depending on who offers a better price for his services.  

All this would have been perfectly fine, if Julien Ravalais-Casanova had not been appointed a year ago by Audrey Azoulay as a senior advisor for partnerships in her Cabinet. In this capacity, he has simultaneously developed all of his political activities in France in flagrant violation of the rules and regulations of the United Nations.  If there is a serious enough reason to get rid of a civil servant immediately, it is his involvement in political life at the national level.  In principle, for a violation of the rules of this magnitude, the dismissal of staff is normally decided on the spot.

What is the position of the French ambassador to UNESCO, Véronique Roger-Lacan, regarding this proven violation of the rules with the tacit agreement of their DG Audrey Azoulay?  Only the member states can decide how long this French arrogance in the management of the Agency will last. 

 At UNESCO, anything is possible to an extent never seen before. It should also be noted that under Azoulay's tenure, not a single French staff has been sanctioned for wrongdoing despite the long list of misconduct committed by her fellow citizens. All of her heavy sanctions were directed at staff of nationalities other than French.   The role of Bernardin Assiene, the Director of IOS, who is normally the one in charge of proposing sanctions for such huge violations of rules, should also be questioned and challenged in his behavior of covering up the misdeeds of French nationals at UNESCO.

  The question of how many of them actually work for the Agency and how many for French politics remains open after the latest news about Julien Ravalais-Casanova’s occupations.  Covered and orchestrated by the Director of Cabinet Nicolas Kassianides and Director HR Kazumi Ogawa, the appointment of so many of Azoulay's French compatriots is of course an embarrassment and a disgrace for all member states.  Another dilemma for DG Azoulay is the appointment of the Director of the UNESCO office in New York.

Her protégé Eliot Minchenberg was initially nominated for the position, but being from a non-member state of UNESCO, it would be complicated for Azoulay to explain to member states why a Director's position had been given to a representative of a country not paying its dues to the organization.  In addition to the above, several other issues remain open and could be raised at the next session of the Executive board by States that are still concerned about accountability and good governance at UNESCO:

  1) When will DG Azoulay consider that she has pocketed enough taxpayers' money and stop misappropriating public funds for her private occupations? With a millionaire father, how long will she still feel poverty-stricken enough to embezzle public funds from unsuspecting member states? 

   2) Was her French undercover team able to identify the whistleblowers within UNESCO and if so, how would DG Azoulay get the member states to express sincere gratitude for their tireless efforts to reveal the truth? 

3) What is the assignment given by SG Azoulay to the member of her Cabinet, the French Fabrice Aidan? For the record, Aidan was the closest collaborator of Terje Roed-Larsen, the former UN top Mideast envoy, who along with his wife and still Norway ambassador to the UN Mona Juul benefited personally from the generosity of the notorious pedophile Jeffrey Epstein. So, what is Fabrice Aidan doing at present in her Cabinet? 

   4) What action is being taken against senior DG Azoulay officials who openly promote their mistresses and intimidate staff? What about starting to effectively prevent such misconduct and other harassments like those occurring in CLT and SC Sectors towards staff?  5) Does DG Azoulay intend to reimburse UNESCO for the funds used from the Culture Sector's budget for her vacation boat in Venice earlier this year? 

6) On July 26, DG Azoulay proudly announced that she would travel to Kiev the next day for a series of important meetings with President Zelensky and the ministers responsible for relations with UNESCO. Then, for reasons of French domestic politics, she was abruptly stopped by her French bosses at the Quai d'Orsay, and the official visit of a UN agency head was cancelled hours before she was to fly to Ukraine.

Why was this important visit for the image of UNESO cancelled and is the DG expected to visit Ukraine in the near future?  This is where UNESCO stands today, a UN agency ravaged by greed and financial misappropriations, propitious to the flourishing of abuse of power, corruption and nepotism. Watch this site.

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