As
UN
Silent on
Malawi &
Congo, Ban-Lib
Syria
Statement
Laundered by
Wires
By
Matthew
Russell Lee
UNITED
NATIONS,
April 6 -- On
a day when the
UN in New York
was closed and
essentially
did nothing,
including not
answering
questions
about the
death of the
president of
Malawi and a
mutiny in
Eastern Congo
where
it has a
peacekeeping
mission, 7 pm
Secretary
General Ban
Ki-moon's
spokesman
Martin Nesirky
sent an
e-mail.
It
conveyed a
canned quote
from Ban
Ki-moon, a
seeming cut
and paste
statement that
might have
been issued
yesterday, or
last week, or
from
Washington,
or Paris. It
seemed
perfunctory --
but soon it
appeared, in
full and
with no added
analysis or
context, on
the Reuters
newswire.
AFP
issued a
longer story,
but the
additional
length was
only Ban
Ki-moon's
quotes
from the day
before,
combined with
more quotes
from Nesirky.
This is
what these
professional
journalists
call having
two source --
i.e.,
"confirmation."
The
problem with
this is that
it gives the
impression
that something
is being done
when it is
not. Even the
most
passionately
anti-Assad
activist is
ill-served by
this type of
cut and paste
stenography,
or quote
laundering.
But this is
what happened
on Good
Friday, as on
so many
other days.
And
here are two
questions
which Ban
Ki-moon's
spokesman
Nesirky has
neither
answered
nor even
confirmed
receipt of, on
actual new
topics on
which the UN
is supposed to
have something
to say, not
least because
it spends
hundreds of
millions of
dollars a year
in the Congo
with a
peacekeeping
mission more
robust than it
wants to send
to Syria:
What
is
the UN /
MONUSCO doing
about the
reported
fighting in
the Eastern
DRC involving
fighters
aligned with
Bosco
Ntaganda? What
is the UN
doing about
Ntaganda?
Can
the
UN confirm,
and does the
S-G have any
comment on,
the reported
death of the
president of
Malawi?
After
15 hours, no
answer. As the
fairytale
says, the
Emperor has no
clothes. Watch
this
site.
, 
