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On
Sri Lanka, UN's Nambiar Resists
Briefing the Council on His "Confidential" Trip: Is a USG Subpoena
Needed?
Byline: Matthew
Russell Lee of
Inner City Press at the UN: News Analysis
UNITED NATIONS, April 21 -- Despite having been sent
as the UN's envoy
to the "bloodbath on the beach" in Sri Lanka, Ban Ki-moon's chief of
staff Vijay Nambiar is now reluctant to give the Security Council even
a closed
door briefing on the crisis, sources told Inner City Press late
Tuesday.
One well-placed Council diplomat said that despite
all 15 members,
including China and Russia, agreeing to an "informal interactive
dialogue" with Mr. Nambiar, who has just returned via India from three
days in Sri Lanka, they were told that Nambiar views the matter as "too
sensitive" even for discussion behind closed doors. Nambiar argued that
as
a "mediator," what he discussed with Sri Lanka's president Mahinda
Rajapaksa and his brothers was "confidential," even from the Security
Council.
One Permanent Five member of the Council, in this
account, has protested
Nambiar's refusal, which will be transmitted to Nambiar and the
Secretariat by
Council President Claude Heller on Mexico. At press time late Tuesday,
the
projected Wednesday afternoon briefing of the Council, at least by
Nambiar, is
in doubt. Nambiar has argued that "it is mostly a humanitarian and not
a
political situation," as Council source, and China before that, have
put
it.
UN's Nambiar at right re Myanmar, reluctance
to brief not shown
Thus, Nambiar argues, the Office for the
Coordination of Humanitarian
Affairs should give the briefing, not him. But it is Nambiar who with
such
fanfare flew to Colombo. And OCHA chief John Holmes, who has not been
in Sri
Lanka for weeks, is now in China. The only other option would be Hitoki
Den,
below director level in the UN Department of Political Affairs, who
accompanied
Nambiar on his trip.
Even regarding
Myanmar, Under Secretary General Ibrahim Gambari briefs the Council,
and then takes questions from the media.
Council and other UN sources
expressed
amazement that in this Sri Lanka case a UN Under Secretary General
would attempt to rebuff a request
to brief the Council, on one of his few pieces of public work during
Ban
Ki-moon's administration. Perhaps the Security Council needs to serve
Nambiar a
subpoena... Watch
this site.
Footnote:
We continue to wait for the
UK's formal answer to the first of the two
questions which Inner
City
Press asked the UK Mission to
the UN two questions on Sri Lanka early on April 15:
Does the UK
believe that international law and the
rights of UN humanitarian staff are being violated by the
now-acknowledged
detention of UN staff in the Sri Lankan government's “IDP” camps?
It has been reported
this morning that Sri Lanka's “minister also told the
British
Foreign Secretary that there was concern that the LTTE would
continue to
consolidate its fortification of the No-Fire Zone.” Please confirm the
accuracy
of that, and of this
and if so, does the UK interpret it as saying that
an offensive on the No-Fire Zone and the civilians in it will begin?
What did
the UK Foreign Secretary say?
As
of
this press time more than six and a half days later, the formal answer
has been
referral to Minister
Miliband's April 12
statement, and this.
Now, the same question has been posed to another Permanent Five
member's Permanent Representative. As more answers arrive or are
released we will report them on this site.
Click here
for an Inner City Press YouTube channel video, mostly UN Headquarters
footage, about civilian
deaths
in Sri Lanka.
Click here for Inner City
Press' March 27 UN debate
Click here for Inner City
Press March 12 UN (and AIG
bailout) debate
Click here for Inner City
Press' Feb 26 UN debate
Click
here
for Feb.
12 debate on Sri Lanka http://bloggingheads.tv/diavlogs/17772?in=11:33&out=32:56
Click here for Inner City Press' Jan.
16, 2009 debate about Gaza
Click here for Inner City Press'
review-of-2008 UN Top Ten debate
Click here for Inner
City Press' December 24 debate on UN budget, Niger
Click here from Inner City Press'
December 12 debate on UN double standards
Click here for Inner
City Press' November 25 debate on Somalia, politics
and this October 17 debate, on
Security Council and Obama and the UN.
* * *
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
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