As
France
Fabius Meets
Ban, UN
Doesn't List
or Disclose
it,
Ladsous &
W. Sahara Qs
By
Matthew
Russell Lee
UNITED
NATIONS,
May 19, updated
-- France's
new foreign
minister
Laurent
Fabius, the
French Mission
to the UN
gushed before
8 am on
Friday, would
meet Secretary
General Ban
Ki-moon on
Saturday to
discuss
"Syria, Israel
- Palestine,
the Sahel,
Somalia and
Rio + 20."
There
are, of
course,
questions
about this
hyped-up tete
a tete: why
not list
Western
Sahara, since
one of ousted
foreign
minister Alain
Juppe's
last meetings
was with the
new Moroccan
foreign
minister, who
is
trying to oust
UN mediator
Christopher
Ross?
Jean Marc
Ayrault seems
to have
different view
of Western
Sahara. Does
Fabius?
There
is also the
question, much
talked about
at the UN, of
when
Ambassador
Gerard
Araud will
leave New
York, or at
least the UN.
Others wonder
if
uncommunicative
UN
Peacekeeping
boss Herve
Ladsous,
who Nicolas
Sarkozy pushed
in as a last
minute
replacement
for Jerome
Bonnafont
when the
latter bragged
too much about
getting the
job, should
now
himself be
replaced by a
less
autocratic and
more qualified
French
military
figure.
Amid
these
questions, it
seemed worth
asking WHEN
this meeting
of Fabius and
Ban
would be
taking place.
Every day the
UN posts a
schedule for
Ban, and
meeting with
foreign
ministers are
usually also
listed as
photo
opportunities,
sometimes
followed by
media question
and answer
sessions on
the North Lawn
building's
second floor,
or less
formally
on the first
floor where
the Moroccan
foreign
minister, for
example,
took questions
from Inner
City Press.
But
on Friday 12
hours after
the French
Mission's
announcement,
Ban's schedule
still
did not list
Fabius.
And so Inner
City Press
asked Ban's
office,
since the French
Mission does
not answer
questions,
the following:
"the French
Mission has
said that new
Foreign
Minister
Laurent
Fabius is
meeting with
the Secretary
General on
Saturday, but
checking the
S-G's schedule
it lists
nothing for
Saturday... IS
the
S-G meeting
with Minister
Fabius on
Saturday? If
so, at what
time?
Will there be
a photo op?
Separately,
will there be
a read out?"
Having no
answer to this
question for
more than
eight hours,
Inner City
Press posed it
more publicly.
Still,
nothing.
Then the
French Mission
- but not the
UN -- posted a
photograph but
no read out of
the meeting.
Fabius
was not added
to Ban
Ki-moon's
online
schedule, nor
has any read
out been
provided, just
as it was not
of Ban's
meeting with
Morocco's
foreign
minister
(which was, at
least, listed
in Ban's
schedule.)
The most
recent analogy
to this was a
call Ban made
to the
presiddent of
Mongolio about
the
incarceration
of that
country's
former leader,
a call that
Mongolia
publicized but
the UN didn't
even
acknowledge
took place
until Inner
City Press
asked at the
noon briefing.
France is a
Permanent Five
member of the
Security
Council;
it seems
unlikely
things would
be done this
way with, for
example,
Mr. Lavrov or
Hillary
Clinton. So
why with
Fabius? Watch
this site.
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