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

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, December 10 -- Five years after the UN brought cholera to Haiti, for Human Rights Day, the UN Security Council got letters from 2,000 victims of its peacekeeping mission in Haiti, MINUSTAH. Inner City Press on December 10, Human Rights Day, asked UN Deputy Spokesperson Farhan Haq, video here, transcript here:

Inner City Press: On Haiti, I wanted to ask you, there were… there were two, some 2,000 letters of victims of cholera that were supposed to be delivered today to MINUSTAH [United Nations Stabilization Mission in Haiti] in Port-au-Prince.  They’ve also been put online to be read, and the request by those turning them in is that they be turned over by MINUSTAH to Security Council members.  And they asked for the Security Council to urge Ban Ki-moon to take responsibility for the introduction of cholera to Haiti and two other points.

Can you comment on the letters?  I understand that the legal position remains the same, but factually, have these letters been received?  And will MINUSTAH or DPKO [Department of Peacekeeping Operations], in fact, transmit these victim letters to Security Council members?

Deputy Spokesman:  Well, we need to check, first of all, whether the letters have been formally received by MINUSTAH, and so we’d have to check on that.

Eight hours later, there was NOTHING from the UN.

The cover letter, seen by Inner City Press on December 9 and now online here, asks each of the Security Council's 15 members to

1. Publicly call on the UN Secretary-General to acknowledge UN responsibility for introducing cholera to Haiti and apologize to the Haitian people;

2. Commit to creating a fair framework for providing reparations to victims, and to providing the funds needed to compensate victims. This would fulfill the UN’s international legal obligations and ensure that victims’ right to a remedy is finally recognized;

3. Provide the resources needed to install the water and sanitation infrastructure necessary to eliminate cholera in Haiti. The UN announced its support for plan to eliminate cholera in Haiti in 2012, but the plan has received only 13% of the funding needed. Fundraising hasbeen stalled for over one year. During this time cholera infection rates have increased.

  The cover letter is signed by Inisyativ Victim Kolera Sodo (IVIKSO), Asosyasyon Viktim Kolera Boukan Kare (ASOVIKBO), Òganizasyon Vikim Kolera nan Mibale (OVIKMi), Gwoupman Viktim Kolera Lachapèl (GVIKLA).

 On December 9 at the UN there was a canned discussion of Ban Ki-moon's “Rights Up Front,” formed after another failure, in Sri Lanka. But this all gets erased, even as the UN barely acts amid the killings in Burundi. Impunity, as with the rapes and cover up in the Central African Republic. And now 2,000 letters from Haiti. Will there finally be some accountability?

Back on October 14, on the morning the UN Security Council was poised to renew its MINUSTAH mission's mandate without taking any responsibility for cholera, the portraits of the diseases (and the UN's) victims were placed outside the UN's 43rd Street entrance.

Inner City Press tweeted a photograph, witnessed the Security Council extending the mandate of its MINUSTAH mission in Haiti 15-0 with no comments before or after, then went at noon and asked UN Spokesman Stephane Dujarric this:

Inner City Press  I want to ask about Haiti and Central African Republic.  On Haiti, I'm compelled to ask you.  I'm sure you saw the people with the portraits of victims outside.  I understand it's taking place outside Geneva and Port-au-Prince.  And I wanted to ask you, the number they're using is 9,000 people killed, 745,000 people sickened by cholera they say the UN brought negligently to their country and there's been no accountability.  And I wanted to know, now that Mr. [Pedro] Medrano seems to have been decommissioned and wasn't replaced, what is the UN's response to… to this sort of being called to task for total lack of accountability and families left without breadwinners, etcetera?

Spokesman Stephane Duajrric:  I think on the legal issues, our stand has not changed.  Obviously, on a more personal level, if you let me speak, I would refer you to what the Secretary-General said when he met victims… families of victims of cholera when he went to Haiti just about a year and a half ago, I believe, or two years ago.  And those feelings still stand.  The work that Mr. Medrano had done on mobilizing resources to take… to help support the sanitation system and the… dealing… and helping Haiti deal with the aftermath of cholera has continued under the auspices of the UN country team.  So it's not as if the UN is not active on this front.

Inner City Press:  I guess my… if… if on the issue of sexual abuse and exploitation there's a move towards setting up a trust fund to compensate victims?  In this case, the families that were supported were left with nothing, so I'm wondering, has the UN done anything in that regard?

Spokesman:  The UN country team and Mr. Medrano had tried to raise funds to deal with the aftermath of the cholera.

Inner City Press:  Only the water issues.

Spokesman:  What's your CAR question?

  For the record, the CAR question was and is about peacekeepers raping civilians.

   On a daily basis across from the UN's 43rd Street entrance stands a Haitian journalist; Inner City Press' requests to the UN including former spokesperson Michele Montas to get him re-admitted fell on the UN's deaf ears. Now he wants to know the prospective Haitian military force's size.

  Ban Ki-moon dodged service of legal papers; his spokespeople answer every Press question with the same answer, “Our position hasn't changed.” Well, it should. Now Ban is embroiled in a corruption scandal in which business interests from Macau were able to purchase revisions by the Secretariat in official UN documents. But the UN's Haitian victims are outside the gate.

   Joseph Dade Guiwil, a cholera survivor whose portrait is featured at the UN, said in an embargoed statement, “Every family in my community lost something because UN peacekeepers gave us cholera. I say to the UN: give us justice.”  The embargo was broken by Associated Press. There will be more reporting, and questions, including in connection with the mandate of UN Peacekeeping's Herve Ladsous' MINUSTAH mission - which despite repeated requests refuses to send its press releases, such as they are, to Inner City Press. This is today's UN. We'll have more on this.

When UN envoy to Haiti Sandra Honore took questions outside the UN Security Council on October 8, Inner City Press asked her about the upcoming electoral run-off, the high profile resignation of Nehemy Joseph, and cholera. Video here.

  Honore put the best face she could on the elections, and on Nehemy Joseph's resignation, saying he would be replaced. She did not respond to Inner City Press' question on cholera, but to her credit did stay at the stakeout when Inner City Press asked what the UN is doing for and about those being ejected from the Dominican Republic. Supporting the Haitian government, was her answer.

Back on June 16 with mass deportations threatened from the Dominican Republic to Haiti, Inner City Press asked the UN, who deputy spokesperson Farhan Haq called it "hypothetical." A day later, New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio issued a statement of concern about the threatened deportations.

 On June 18, Inner City Press again asked the UN about the deportation threat, and if the UN might follow Jose Ramos Horta's advise that it compensate victims of the cholera it brought to Haiti:

Inner City Press: On Haiti I think it's, I guess, on Tuesday, I'd asked you about this planned repatriation from the Dominican Republic.  And now that a variety of… the Mayor of the City of New York has spoken on it and most poignantly the President of Haiti, Mr. [Michel] Martelly, had said they won’t accept individuals that were not born in Haiti, which would stand to leave a lot of people stateless; meaning, Haitians… “Haitians that were born in Santa Domingo”.  And I've also read that UN was attending meetings planning for what was to happen, so what is the UN's position on this?

Deputy Spokesman Haq:  What I can say on that is the Dominican Government has given assurances that it will apply due process standards on an individual basis and will protect individuals against unlawful deportation.  The United Nations urges respect for international law and humanitarian principles.  In the event of an increase in the scale of deportations, the United Nations calls for close coordination between the Haitian and Dominican Governments to ensure an orderly and transparent process open to observation by the UN and the international community.  The United Nations remains commits to resolve the problems of the people who are deprived of nationality as a result of the 2013 ruling of the Dominican Constitutional Court.

Inner City Press:  Thanks.  Also on Haiti, I wanted… I meant to ask you this yesterday, but I'll ask today, José Ramos-Horta of the panel in this room on Tuesday, on cholera in Haiti, said that he said he would believe, you know, I'm going to paraphrase here, that the UN should have paid compensation and he brought up as two examples peacekeepers in Timor-Leste, upon knowing that death had been caused inadvertently, they just offered to pay one individual, paid his salary over his remaining deployment there.  I wanted to know, given he is a highly respected person to be the head of the panel, you know, not as a “gotcha”, but is there some response to the approach, the way that he laid it out, that making victims whole comes before any kind of legal argumentation?

Deputy Spokesman:  Basically, of course, as you're aware well aware, he is essentially expressing his personal opinion on this.  His panel's work was not on the question of Haiti.  We have heard, as you know, a wide range of opinions over the years and have respected a wide range of views on this.  The Secretary-General has tried as hard as he can to make sure that the situation of cholera in Haiti is resolved.  As you have seen from the efforts of Pedro Medrano, what we are trying to do is coordinate efforts with the Government of Haiti and the international community to see what can be done to bring this cholera epidemic to an end.  And so, we will continue with those efforts and we respect the views of people around.  On the legal question, our position remains as it was.

What is wrong with this picture?

UN official Herve Ladsous, who has openly refused to answer Inner City Press question and was abetted in this by Secretary General Ban Ki-moon's spokesperson in his last press conference, used that to brag about ostensibly declining numbers of sexual exploitation and abuse complaints against his UN Peacekeeping: 51 worldwide for a whole year.

  But now it emerges that in Haiti alone, the UN Office of Internal Oversight Services documented 225 women sexual exploited by Ladsous' peacekeepers. This is a cover up; Ladsous should answer or go. On June 10, Inner City Press asked UN spokesperson Stephane Dujarric, video here, transcript here:

Inner City Press: I want to ask about sexual abuse. I'm sure you've seen AP's report on the OIOS [Office of Internal Oversight Services] report on sexual exploitation and abuse, particularly in MINUSTAH [United Nations Stabilization Mission] in Haiti, saying 225 women testified that they were exchange — you know, asked by peacekeepers to exchange sex for money or food or whatever.  So how do you square this with the report made here by the Mr. [Hervé] Ladsous that only 51 cases of sexual exploitation or abuse were alleged worldwide, 51 as opposed to 225 in one country?  And what's going to be done to square what seems to be a dramatic underreporting by the UN?

Spokesman Dujarric:  I think the — first of all, the report that you referred to in the Associated Press filing, as far as my understanding is concerned, it's still a draft report.  There's still comments going back and forth, as usually there are between the concerned department and OIOS.  So I'm not going to go into what's said in the report.

Obviously, the issue of underreporting is of concern.  Every case needs to be looked into.  Every case of sexual abuse needs to be looked into.  The Secretary-General is determined to continue on the zero-tolerance policy.  I think if you look at the special measures report that was issued earlier this year, I think it outlines a number of steps that were taken.  And obviously, you know, all sorts of things are looked at in terms of prohibited conduct, discouraged conduct and others.  So, you know, the report's still in draft form.  I don't have any information on the specific cases you mentioned.

Inner City Press:  Maybe the number will somehow be reduced, but what I did want to ask you is, can you say from this podium that peacekeepers requesting sex in exchange for money or food does constitute sexual exploitation and abuse, for the purposes of this 51 figure that was thrown out in this room?

Spokesman Dujarric:  Again, I'm not go into that.  I think if you look at the Secretary-General's special measures report, I think it outlines those things and it answers your question

 This resistance to saying that eacekeepers requesting sex in exchange for money or food does constitute sexual exploitation and abuse is part of the problem. We'll have more on this.

 On June 8, Inner City Press asked UN Spokesman Stephane Dujarric first about the French forces' non-inclusion in Ban's Children and Armed Conflict list, then about the whistleblowers, video here, transcript here:

Inner City Press: it seems like the abuse the UN was aware of in the Central African Republic by the French Sangaris forces, was there any consideration of including them and if so, why not?

Spokesman Dujarric:  On the CAR [Central African Republic], the situation in the CAR, part of the CAR was drafted with the information available at the time of the writing of the report.  As you know, the… we do hope to announce soon the external independent inquiry which will shed light on the process.

Inner City Press: I'm sorry to reiterate this.  I'd sent you these questions but wanted to ask you.  I asked the Office of High Commissioner for Human Rights who said that Mr. Kompass is going to be extended, although he also said it's not Geneva's decision; it's up to New York.  And there are several Member State who believe he's not being extended--

Spokesman:  No, I have no indication whatsoever that his contract will not be renewed.

Inner City Press:  It does apparently expire in one month.

Spokesman:  Right.  No, as I said, I have no indication whatsoever that his contract will not be renewed.

Inner City Press: ]OHCHR] had said something about contracts being automatically extended if a person is under investigation.  Is that your understanding?

Spokesman:  I think that is very likely a policy but as I said, for Mr. Kompass, I have no indication that his…

Inner City Press: The other thing I asked you is about Miranda Brown who was an… worked with Mr. Kompass and has since been terminated.  I know that she wrote a letter to the Secretary-General dated 23 May saying she's willing to participate, but not if she's fired by the UN and has no immunity.  Has the Secretary-General’s responded to the letter?

Spokesman:  I don't believe there has been a response.  I don't know if it was received.  I don't believe she was terminated, I think her fixed-term contract was not renewed.

Inner City Press: What would you say to those who say if you actually want to know… this was a person who was number two to Kompass at the time involved.  What arrangements were being made to try to get her evidence?

Spokesman:  I think we would have to leave that to the panel once it's named.

  On May 7, Inner City Press asked more questions about this - including to Herve Ladsous himself.

  After a long closed-door consultation meeting of the Security Council, Ladsous emerged. Inner City Press asked him, based on Paragraph 9 of the UNDT ruling, Why did you ask Kompass to resign?"

  Ladsous stopped and said, "I deny that." Inner City Press put the handheld video online, here.