UNITED
NATIONS, April
10 -- Where is
the line
between the
judicially
ordered
death penalty
and the quasi-
or
pseudo-judicial
process now
associated
with
anti-terrorist
drone strikes
by the US and
other
countries?
Inner
City Press put
the question
to three UN
ambassadors,
including
Gerard
Araud of
France which
is engaged in
such an
anti-terrorist
or
anti-Jihadist
fight in Mali,
as well as to
two
representatives
of
Amnesty
International.
Amnesty's
report
on the death
penalty, under
embargo until
today,
mentions at
page 23 the
“increased
number of
extrajudicial
executions” in
North Korea.
Inner
City Press
cited this,
and asked AI
about Obama's
drones
strikes, and
Ambassador
Araud about
France's
strikes in
Mali.
At
first, Araud
let the
Ambassador of
Benin answer
for France
about
Mali. After
his answer --
and after
another
question was
asked by
another
journalist,
Araud to his
credit re-took
the microphone
to
answer.
He
said strikes
in Mali are
not through
the judicial
process, and
follow
the laws of
war. But isn't
that what
Obama, and
Bush before
him, have
said?
How
can one be
against
execution
through a
judicial
process, but
for
death from the
sky with much
less due
process? That
is the
question.
Amnesty
International
stated a
position of principle,
not
unlike that of
D-G Shetty on
not arming the
rebels in
Syria:
AI
is
always against
the death
penalty, and
calls Obama's
recent moves
only a
“patina.”
On
the Democratic
Republic of
Congo, a
country with a
truly abysmal
justice
system, if the
failure to
prosecute
those in the
two
battalions
involved in
the mass rape
of 126 women
and in
November in
late November
2012 is any
guide, Inner
City Press
asked if the
UN
peacekeeping
mission there
should be
doing more,
and if any of
the
Ambassador
could state
anything DRC
has done about
the rapes.
Again
it was Benin's
Ambassador who
answered, and
interestingly.
But what
about Araud?
France not
only claims
“the pen” in
the Security
Council on the
DRC -- the
head of
Peacekeeping,
Herve
Ladsous,
is the
fourth
Frenchman in a
row to hold
the post.
Ladsous
claimed
to have given
an ultimatum
to the DRC
government,
then let
the deadline
pass without
disclosing any
action taken.
He has refused
to answer
since. Araud
make a point
of answering
on Mali --
appreciated --
but did not on
the DRC. Watch
this site.
Footnote:
Relatedly,
Agence France
Presse's Tim
Witcher asking
a soft ball
question in
French. On the
Minova rapes
and other
Peacekeeping
spin,
he had been
the
pass-through
for Ladsous'
half answers
to question
Ladsous
refuses to
answer from
Inner City
Press.
But
now a new low
has been hit, alongside
the UN's
non-consensual
raid of
Inner City
Press' office
and the
leaking of
photographs of
its desk and
bookshelf to
BuzzFeed.
Witcher filed
a complaint on
March 8 with
UN Security
beginning with
a question
Inner City
Press asked
Ladsous
(about the
Minova rapes)
and how it was
asked.
Who
does Witcher
represent? AFP has
been asked, in
light of
Witcher's
March 8 false
complaint for
Ladsous,
who has served
on an AFP
management
board, and
we are waiting
for a
response.
Watch this
site.
, 
