As UN Worker Released in Mogadishu, UN Transcript Deletes Word "Bail"

Byline: Matthew Russell Lee of Inner City Press at the UN: News Analysis

UNITED NATIONS, October 23 -- When the Somali Transitional Federal Government released the local head of the UN World Food Program, UN spokesperson Michele Montas in New York said "he is supposed to be out on bail, according to the people in charge." Video here, from Minute 14:20. The phrase "on bail" was later deleted or omitted from the UN's transcript of the briefing. Inner City Press asked if the UN had agreed to stop distributing aid through mosques, reportedly the reason for the TFG's arrest of Idris Osman. Ms. Montas answered that "the distribution through mosques has been continuing." Video here, from Minute 17:16. Soon thereafter, two corrections arrived:

Subj: Info on Somalia
From: WFP NY Spokesperson
To: matthew.lee [at] innercitypress.com
cc: OSSG
Date: 10/23/2007 12:54:49 PM Eastern Standard Time

Hi Matthew,

Here is the latest on Somalia about release of our WFP staffer and your questions: No bail was requested. Mr. Osman was released because of a decision by President. WFP and the Transitional Federal Government will shortly launch a joint fact-finding mission looking into the circumstances of his detention on 17 October. Food distributions will resume in Mogadishu as soon as possible with the agreement of the Transitional Federal Government. We will distribute food in the most effective way to reach the people in need. We cannot rule out it being through the mosques.

            This was reiterated -- and inserted into the UN's summary of the noon briefing, as if it had been said:

Subj: revised if-asked on Somalia questions
From: ossg [at] un.org
To: matthew.lee [at] innercitypress.com
Date: 10/23/2007 3:01:23 PM Eastern Standard Time

Asked why Osman had been detained, the Spokeswoman said that he was now back at work at the UN office in Mogadishu upon a decision by the President, with no charges laid against him. WFP and the Transitional Federal Government will shortly launch a joint fact-finding mission looking into the circumstances of his detention.

Asked about WFP food distribution through mosques in Mogadishu, Montas later added that food distributions had been interrupted after Somali National Security Service officers entered the UN compound in Mogadishu on 17 October. They will resume in Mogadishu as soon as possible, with the agreement of the Transitional Federal Government. Asked whether distributions will resume through mosques, Montas said that WFP had announced that they would distribute food in the most effective way to reach the people in need, including through the mosques.

            If the UN can re-write the summaries and transcripts of its noon briefing, why not its relations with Somalia's Transitional Federal Government?

UN WFP truck in Somalia, bail not shown

            Inner City Press on October 18 asked UN humanitarian coordinator Eric Laroche if the issue underlying the arrest was the TFG ordering the UN to cease delivering aid through mosques, Mr. Laroche answered that no charges had been filed. He said he would not answer "political" questions; the UN office that would is still based in Nairobi, not Somalia. After some initial misunderstanding, he largely dodged Inner City Press' questions about what he'd done in meeting in Washington. A DC source tells Inner City Press that at an October 17 meeting there, Laroche made excuses for the mayor of Mogadishu, who equated non-TFG-supporting refugees as "terrorists" by saying, "Mohamed Dheere is Mohamed Dheere and he is known to speak aggressively but..." But what?

   Inner City Press asked if Laroche now acknowledged that the UN had gotten too close to the TFG and the organizers of the National Reconciliation Congress. Video here. Laroche called the latter a political question he would not answer. On the former, he said that "no one" -- he listed the donors, NGOs, the international community and the UN -- is against the idea of there being structure in Somalia. No one, indeed. But structure imposed by whom, and how? To be continued.

* * *

Clck here for a Reuters AlertNet piece by this correspondent about Uganda's Lord's Resistance Army.  Click here for an earlier Reuters AlertNet piece by this correspondent about the Somali National Reconciliation Congress, and the UN's $200,000 contribution from an undefined trust fund.  Video Analysis here

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