Inner City Press: Investigative Reporting from the United Nations

As UN Council Touts Ban 2d Term, GRULAC Hasn't Endorsed, Process Questioned

By Matthew Russell Lee, News analysis

UNITED NATIONS, June 17 -- Who chooses the UN Secretary General and how? On Friday at the UN, the 15 members of the Security Council in a closed door meeting, not even by vote, recommended Ban Ki-moon for a second five year term by acclamation.

Moments later the President of the Security Council for June, the Ambassador of Gabon, came to the stakeout to read on camera a statement that “in a private meeting,” Ban was recommended.

When Inner City Press asked, “are you aware that GRULAC has not endorsed Ban?” he walked away from the microphone. Standing by the stakeout was Kim Won-soo, Ban's chief adviser and ostensible deputy to chief of staff Vijay Nambiar.

GRULAC is the Latin American and Caribbean states group. On June 7, Inner City Press reported that five GRULAC members had said they didn't have instructions from their capitals to endorse Ban.

Earlier on Friday Inner City Press stood outside the GRULAC meeting in the UN's North Lawn building. When Colombia's Ambassador emerged to attend the Council's 11 am meeting, he told Inner City Press that one country was still saying it didn't have instructions. He offered a name; later the spokesperson of a Western Council member said “I think it is Barbados,” amid laughter.

But the critique by GRULAC was more substantial, that Ban was too attentive to Permanent Five members of the Council, ignoring even countries which contribute peacekeepers to the missions voted by the Security Council.

Ban & book; rights communications withheld to keep access

Some of the Security Council members who made much of the unanimous recommendation for Ban say in other settings that Ban's pliant style is bad for the UN and multilateralism.

Something is wrong with a process in which, despite this view, unanimous reappointment for five years is delivered without any competition, no other candidates, not even a campaign speech and pledges.

The General Assembly vote is scheduled for June 21 at 3 pm. As one GRULAC Permanent Representative told Inner City Press, “once the Permanent Five decide, we are all just window dressing.” Watch this site.

* * *

At UN, Lack of GRULAC Endorsement Delays Ban's Re-Appointment

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, June 16 -- When Ban Ki-moon ten days ago announced he wanted a second term as UN Secretary General, he went to meet behind closed doors with the UN's Regional Groups. As first reported by Inner City Press on June 7, in the Latin American and Caribbean States group, called GRULAC, at least five countries said they needed more time.

Nevertheless it was announced that the Security Council would meet on June 16 to recommend Ban for a second term. Ban's Spokesperson's Office on June 15 issued a schedule with re-appointment on the Council's agenda.

But early on June 16, this changed. Ban's Spokesperson's Office put out another announcement, that only the Council's “Program of Work” would be considered on June 16.

Sources tell Inner City Press this is because GRULAC has still not endorsed Ban for a second term. Ban has spend the last five days in Latin America. But as one source put it, “look at his record, especially in Latin America.”

In typical UN fashion, the source pointed first to Ban's appointments, or doling out of top posts. “Oscar Fernandez Taranco he calls a high Latin appointment. But some say the guy's Italian,” the source said. Asked about Ban's recent appointment of Mariano Ferandez, a Chilean to head up the UN's Mission in Haiti (MINUSTAH), another source said “that was only for Bachelet.” The Haitian government, it's said, preferred a Trinidadian candidate. “What has Bachelet accomplished for Ban?” the source asked.

(Inner City Press notes that Bachelet's UN Women office has responded to questions about allegations of rape by UN peacekeepers in South Kordofan in Sudan, by asking the Department of Peacekeeping Operations at the highest level.)

More generally as one GRULAC source told Inner City Press, “Ban has not focused on Latin America enough. We want a commitment that this would change in a second term.” Watch this site.

* * *

As Ban Ki-moon Moves For 2d UN Term, Human Rights Groups Go Silent To Keep Access, Press Controlled

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, June 13 -- Ban Ki-moon has been subject to critiques for being weak on human rights for nearly all of his four and a half years as UN Secretary General. While such weakness is surely a comfort to many UN member states, to others at least on paper it should be a problem, in supporting him for a second term. So how did Ban seek to turn this around?

One way is to control what people say. In the run-up to Ban's drive for a second term, Human Rights Watch had been critical of Ban's record. But after HRW director Kenneth Roth met with Ban this Spring, and Inner City Press asked HRW on the record if Roth had brought up Ban's record in Myanmar, Sudan or Sri Lanka, the response by HRW's UN Director,a former journalist, was:

“To preserve our ability to have frank discussions with UN officials and advance our advocacy goals, we don't typically communicate on the content of discussions we have with them.”

UN officials, of course, should not condition listening to or acting on human rights concerns on the silence of their interlocutors. (Separately, it is unclear to whom HRW would communicate what it raised: only donors?)

But such a non-answer, delivered less than ten days before the June 6 campaign kick off for a second term as UN Secretary General, is certainly better for Ban.

Earlier this Spring a group of ethnic Tamils came to the UN trying to deliver a petition calling for an international investigation into what they -- and Ban's own Panel of Experts -- call the killing of tens of thousands of Tamil civilians by Sri Lanka's government.

They asked Inner City Press to cover their demonstration across First Avenue from Ban's office. The Ban administration told them that a mid level official would be willing to accept the handover of their petition in the lobby of the UN General Assembly, but that no members of the press should be among their group.

Inner City Press stood to the side, to not hear anything that was said, and took two photographs of the handover. Shortly thereafter, Inner City Press was told that if photos of the handover were published, the Ban administration would not meet again with that group.

There are in the wider world worse ways to silence people. But questions exist as to whether these actions are appropriate to the UN, not only for the past five years, but for five to come. Watch this site.

Ban & Gaddafi: one candidate elections not shown

Inner City Press asked if Sri Lanka spoke, and the DPR said yes, Syria as well. He did not see any North Korea representative in the room, he said. We will have more on this.

Update of 1:30 pm -- US Deputy Permanent Representative Rosemary DiCarlo, exiting the Security Council, answered about Ban second term by saying the US will be issuing a statement. In the IMF race, Timothy Geithner hedges on whether US supports Christine Lagarde, there being a Mexican candidate Agostin Carstens in the race. So why this one-candidate process at the UN?

Click for Mar 1, '11 BloggingHeads.tv re Libya, Sri Lanka, UN Corruption

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

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

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

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