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By Matthew Russell Lee, CJR PFT NYP

UNITED NATIONS GATE, May 12 –After Paul Biya who has ruled Cameroon for 36 years on January 28 had his opponent Maurice Kamto arrested, Inner City Press again asked UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres and his spokesmen for their comment and action, if any. This came after Guterres had Inner City Press roughed up on 3 July 2018 after it interviewed Biya's Ambassador about the two men's Budget Committee deals and banned from the UN since - Guterres even tried to get Inner City Press banned from the Park East Synagogue, here, which was denied / dodged by his spokesman Stephane Dujarric, who put up then took down a podcast in which he brags about his "mutually assured destruction" relationship with journalists, here. After whispers from the UN Security Council about a belated UNSC meeting on May 13, early on the morning of May 6 Inner City Press submitted written questions, this one to the UN Mission of Belgium which has done nothing at all about Guterres' now 312 days of banning Inner City Press: "Press Q re Cameroon, any UNSC meeting, Belgian Mission's position on that and continued banning of Inner City Press from entering UN - To: peter.verbrugghe [at] diplobel.fed.be, isabelle.bardijn [at] diplobel.fed.be, newyorkUN [at] diplobel.fed.be: this is a Press request to the Belgian Mission as a member of the UN Security Council to be informed this morning of your Mission's knowledge of any upcoming UNSC meeting about Cameroon of any kind, including Any Other Business informal consultations, whether May 13 or any other date. Inner City Press wrote to you about this in July 2018, below.     Also, what is your country's position on the situation there and what will / would it seek to accomplish at any UNSC meeting (and if there is no meeting, why not). Relatedly, please explain how it is legitimate for the UN to bar entry to Inner City Press after ousting it while it covered the 3 July 2018 Fifth (Budget) Committee then chaired by Cameroon, and asked about this situation and other under-performance by the UN. Inner City Press' most recent application for re-accreditation to enter and cover the UNSC stakeout, submitted on 15 April 2019, was denied without explanation on April 17. ("Greetings Matthew LEE from ICP     INNER CITY PRESS,  Your media accreditation request, with reference no: M66561081, has been declined.") What has your Mission does, or what will it do, about this?" Six full days later, after UN noon briefings promoting Guterres' and Dujarric's current European junket, and still no answer - as the EU's PR to the UN tweets photos of himself with Biya's Tommo Monthe.

And we now report this: on May 13 the UN Security Council will hold on Cameroon the lowest of all forms of sessions on Cameroon, a so called Arria formula meeting of the type it held in 2009 on Sri Lanka after and before the killing of thousands, accomplishing nothing. Unlike even an Any Other Business consultation in the Security Council, all members do not even have to attend. A participant will be Guterres' UK humanitarian chief Mark Lowcock, who has refused to make even the most basic UN public financial disclosure. We'll have more on this.

  More here.

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