At UN Pension Fund, Gag Orders and Mental Health
Accusations as Audit Committee Meets
Byline: Matthew Russell Lee of Inner City Press at
the UN
UNITED NATIONS, February 11 -- As
scandal grows
around the UN Joint Staff Pension Fund, which is
trying to outsource
$9 billion in investments, the Fund's CEO Bernard Cocheme was in Geneva trying
to rally other agencies to his side. As Inner City Press' now five-part series
has shown and will show, it is the UNJSPF's arbitraging of its status as an
inter-agency body, with the claimed ability to circumvent UN rules whenever it
is convenience, that has allowed a lawless fiefdom to flourish with $36 billion
to now dole out.
Meanwhile in New York, the cover-up
accelerated. Despite purported whistleblower protections and new Secretary
General Ban Ki-moon's stated policy for the UN of transparency and of staff
speaking to the media, on Friday the following email went out, referring to
Inner City Press as "ICP," and attempting belatedly to block any
whistle-blowing:
Subject:
Pension Fund under attack in the media
From: Ibrahima
Faye/UNJSPF/NY/UNO
To: UNJSPF IMS
Staff Group, UNJSPF NY Staff Group, UNJSPF NY Consultants Group
Date: February
9, 2007, 10:19 AM
Dear all,
For a week
now, some of our colleagues within the Pension Fund are being subject to
targeted attacks through one media press named ICP. In my qualify as your
representative, it is my outmost duty, whether you are a manager or a simple
staff member, weather [sic] you immediately involved or not, to defend
you all from these yet to be substantiated attacks based on a supposedly
Confidential OIOS report. I would like to caution myself and each one of you for
jumping to immediate conclusions under the given circumstances and be emphatic
to our colleagues whose names are mentioned in that press with possible target
to their privacy and honorability.
Furthermore,
I would like to also caution each one of you for meeting with that press entity
or reporter or any other request for interview as it is strictly forbidden by
the Staff Rule for staff member to make any kind of press announcement or speech
without prior approval, beside, this press ICP is neither a UN investigative
body nor an asermented [sic] United Nations entity.
As the
situation may warrant, I would be obligated to come back to you with more
indepth advises. Remember this is our Pension Fund, our working tool, our
working environment and when the Fund's name is spoiled, we are all concerned
and inbricated [sic] as one.
Beyond the inappropriate and actionable
gag-order nature of this message to all staff, a sad irony is that its putative
author is in multiple insider accounts one of the victims of harassment
at the Pension Fund, as well as a staff representative.
Mr.
Cocheme- "Disagrees" with gag orders?
The Office of Internal Oversight
Services report, referred to above as "supposedly Confidential" but which Inner
City Press provided to the UN Spokesperson's Office at their request on February
8, and has since showed up elsewhere -- contains three paragraph about an
inappropriate relationship between a supervisor and subordinate, and chides the
Pension Fund's management for allowing the supervisor to simply move on to
another UN agency. From the OIOS Report:
111. Although
several examples of perceived favoritism as regards promotions were provided in
ID/OIOS investigators, numerous comments were made about one particular case
involving an alleged intimate affair between a supervisor and her subordinate,
and also about the manner in which the UNJSPF management handled it.
112. The
interviewees commented that the supervisor in question failed to maintain proper
boundaries between her professional and personal life and exhibited bias in the
performance assessment of the subordinate whom she favored, which had a negative
effect on the workplace environment of that office.
113. After the
alleged affair ended, ID/OIOS was told that the supervisor harassed the
subordinate and denied him a promotion... Several interviewees added that the
above mentioned subordinate staff surreptitiously taped his supervisor and
played the tape to 'whoever wanted to listen.'
114. The OIOS
subsequently learned that although both the UNJSPF management and OHRM were
aware of the alleged affair, the supervisor left the UNJSPF and no formal
inquiry was initiated on the matter.
Since even OIOS found this more
significant and than salacious, and since OIOS' pulling of punches may have
played a role in the current lack of action or reform, Inner City Press will
henceforth report on details behind and beyond the OIOS report.
The relationship to which OIOS alludes
was between Eleanor Phillip and the author of Friday's gag-order email. Ms.
Phillip brought him along when she shifted units in the Fund, then later
retaliated. She was allowed to move to ICSE at the UN, and is still in the UN
phone book, hiding in plain sight. The retaliation efforts continued, for
example when the now-gagger agreed as a favor to circulate a staff
representative's email message to all staff. In that case, management used a
"note into employment file" to get its point across. Ironically and sadly, the
retaliation seems to have worked, leading to Friday's quite different mass
email. When even a staff representative, a union man in essence, is turned into
an enforcer of silence to protect management, a new low has been reached. This
is the case in some but by no means all corners of the UN system.
Mental Health
Accusations As Management Technique at UNJSPF
UN Pension Fund management has used
other, more sinister modes of retaliation. Among the most inappropriate has been
accusing those it perceives as troublemakers of having mental problems. These
individuals are then told to go to UN Medical Services on the 5th floor of the
Secretariat building, and are told not to return to work while they are being
evaluated and / or treated. One individual who nevertheless returned to the
Pension Fund was humiliated by being escorted out by security.
The use of mental health accusations as a
management discipline tool is entirely inappropriate. The UN Pension Fund's use
of this tool has created an atmosphere where even its victim have requested a
continue veil of silence, concerned that being associated with even a spurious
allegation of mental problems could hurt their careers and image. Out of
respect, Inner City Press is withholding the names of people victimized by
Pension Fund management's mental health accusations.
The UNJSPF claims in numerous venues that
is it exempt from UN rules. Mr. Dooley, for example, was rejected for a regular
UN contract. But he was given what is called a Pension Fund contract, which does
not entitle its holder to transfer elsewhere in the UN system. Technically, at
least for one of the two time-determined categories of PF contracts, holders are
not eligible for promotions from one UN employment grade to another. However,
those favored within the Fund have been allowed such upgrades, including in
salary, while others have been told no. The most favored people evade review by
the UN's Office of Human Resources Management by entering on a Pension Fund
contract, and then are later "regularized" into normal UN contracts and the
benefits these convey.
When the UNJSPF management team tries to
get in a favored candidate through purported competition, the difficult stage is
the composition of a short-list. Mr. Goddard, for example, Dulcie Bull wanted in
the Fund. OHRM for once objected, but still Goddard got in. He got included in
the short list, and after that it was hard to object. The supposition is that
anyone on the short list is qualified. Those in charge at the Pension Fund know
the best stage at which to intervene.
Often OHRM's objections are only token
and can be overcome. OHRM has for a long time -- too long, the Staff Council has
voted -- been run by Ms. Jan Beagle. Dulcie Bull of the Pension Fund is close
with Ms. Beagle, and has been able to thusly resolve what problems have arisen,
and further limit any outside oversight of the Fund. One of the Staff Council's
stated bases for voting to ask Ban Ki-moon to clean up OHRM is Ms. Beagle's
insider status with the Kofi Annan administration. It is reported that Dulcie
Bull, too, had inordinate sway under Annan, reaching all the way back to when
both were at OHRM along with some other names which thereafter continued to
appear, on the flight logs of UN plane trips and in other UN jobs including at
the also scandal-plagued DESA. This personal connections have played a role in
shielding the Pension Fund from any accountability, to the detriment of UN staff
and pensioners.
Sources Friday said that some Pension
Fund staff, while initially exhilarated by the first installments of this Inner
City Press series, later in the week grew concerned that the investigative
scrutiny might go too far and "wash their dirty laundry in public," or play into
the outsourcing agenda. While Inner City Press follows the facts where they
lead, the series began by reporting widespread opposition to outsourcing
management of even a portion of the Fund. Continued research reveals that it is
a single Member State that is pushing for expedited outsourcing. We will have
more on this, in connection it is hoped with the Pension Fund auditors' meeting,
which should be considering this series. This investigative reporting is not
among the pretexts for outsourcing. A nitty-gritty aspect that is often
overlooked, sources say, is that the woman who was running the North American
equities portfolio fell sick, asked management for help, but was not given any.
Now the porfolio's performance is cited as militating for outsourcing and a
shift in strategy.
Having for years allowed nepotism and
harassment to flourish at the Fund, Mr. Cocheme now faces a General Assembly
inquiry into his failure to implement an Office of Internal Oversight Services
report recommending action against Dulcie Bull and Paul Dooley, and a Pension
Board audit committee meeting this week. Mr. Cocheme has still not made any
Press replies, nor given any explanation of the basis for his stated "rejection"
of the detailed factual findings and recommendations of the OIOS report. Beyond
the report, sources say for example that now-barred contractor Gerald Bodell
chose to live near Mr. Cocheme in order to when possible walk to work with him,
to keep the money flowing. Mr. Cocheme has much to answer for, and although it
is already late, this should begin at this week's meeting of the Pension Fund
audit committee. Developing.
Feedback: Editorial
[at] innercitypress.com
UN Office: S-453A,
UN, NY 10017 USA Tel: 212-963-1439
Reporter's mobile
(and weekends): 718-716-3540
Head of UN Pension Fund Ignores Investigation, While
Whistleblower Speaks in Exclusive Interview
Byline: Matthew Russell Lee of Inner City Press at
the UN
UNITED NATIONS, February 8 -- The chief executive
officer of the UN Joint Staff Pension Fund, Bernard G. Cocheme, faced with a UN
investigative report recommending action against two staff members for their
role in handing out no-bid contracts to one of their former bosses, has said he
will "take no action" against the staff members. The stand-off on corruption at
the Pension Fund now moves to the General Assembly.
Despite detailed adverse findings by the
UN Office of Internal Oversight Services, Paul Dooley and Dulcie C. Bull remain
among UN Pension Fund management, as a controversial outsourcing of $9 billion
in pension investments in North American stocks continues moving forward over
the objections of the staff union and staff council, and the until-now more
muted concerns of the General Assembly.
According to a statement released
Thursday by the UN to Inner City Press, Mr. Cocheme "informed OIOS that he
disagrees with the findings and recommendations of the report of investigation -
as regards the actions of his staff - and advised that he 'intends to take no
action' with regard to them. OIOS advised him that pursuant to its mandate, it
will report his response to the General Assembly."
Inner City Press tried to reach Mr.
Cocheme by telephone for an explanation of his disagreement and refusal to act
on UN investigators' recommendations, but as of press time six hours later, no
response had been received.
The original whistleblower, Yuri
Kondralyev, Thursday evening gave Inner City Press an on-the-record and so-far
exclusive interview about the scandal(s). Combined with information by other
UNJSPF insiders, not for attribution for fear of retaliation, a picture has
emerged of a Pension Fund management out of control.
UNJSPF:
Tell it to the General Assembly
First, some of the tale of Yuri
Kondralyev. His memo along with a well-regarded colleague on October 4, 2005,
detailed corruption both financial and managerial. It was sent to Controller
Warren Sach, to OHRM's Jan Beagle, to OIOS and the now-gone Mark Malloch Brown
and Christopher Burnham. Thursday Mr. Kondralyev told Inner City Press that the
first responses he received were from Bernard Cocheme, and were classic
cover-up. "They nod and do nothing," Mr. Kondralyev says.
According to Mr. Kondralyev, beyond her
involvement in Paul Dooley's shenanigans, Dulcie Bull was abusive to staff, and
knew little of her business. Her answers on matters of pensions were
ill-informed, and most of her work was delegated to one Norah Fitzgerald. In
fact, according to Mr. Kondralyev and other sources, within the Pension Fund
those most able to help pensioners are at the General Service or "G" category,
while the higher-ups coast by with little knowledge, carried by those beneath
them.
Mr. Kondralyev and others describe an
agency out of control, which went beyond its legal powers and bought an office
building, only to be ordered by the UN Office of Legal Affairs to divest it. The
Pension Fund sought special status, to for example allow more expensive business
travel than is the case in the rest of the UN. These days, it is said by inside
sources, Mr. Cocheme is a frequent flier to Geneva by way of Paris. Some is
justified by Pension business, these sources say, and some is not. The problem
is nobody's watching.
The Pension Fund is a club in which a
father can hire his son. Witness, for example, the passage from Ernie De Turris,
former Deputy, to his son Frank, now in the CEO's office (of whom Mr. Kondralyev,
despite noting the inescapable family connection, also has kind words). Witness
Dulcie Bull's hiring of one Hugh O'Donnell, sources say, who then got his
girlfriend hired. Ms. Bull brought in Peter Goddard, saying that of the hundreds
of people who applied, only he was the qualifications. This is what Paul Dooley
said of his friend Gerald Bodell, in giving him sole source IT contracts. It
emerges that beyond Mr. Bodell, there was an even less-present contractor
getting paid, working off-site from Dallas. The money was pouring out the door
and nobody was watching.
An informed source says the problem at
the Pension Fund is the lack of accountability. No matter how badly a decision
works out, no effects are felt. Dulcie Bull hired a woman who, for the first
time in Pension Fund history, was unable to close the books at year's end. Yet
there were no consequences. Later Ms. Bull was named for action in the OIOS
report. But Cocheme denies it, and Ms. Bull made a presentation on pensions
earlier this week. Many personnel issues were referred to OHRM, run by Jan
Beagle, and nothing was done.
That remains Mr. Kondralyev main
complaint, that nothing has been done. He is not bitter: he lives in Riverdale
in the North Bronx, works as a consultant and is writing a book, on economics.
During the above-sketched interview, Inner Cit Press twice asked him if he was
sure he wished to be named, on the record. Mr. Kondralyev said yes without
equivocation. For people with either current and past affiliations with the UN,
in light of propensity to try to retaliate, Inner City Press offers anonymity.
But for now it must be noted that upbeat whistle-blowing is something the UN
needs much more of.
The OIOS report, on which
Inner City
Press was the first to report, on February 5 (click
here for
that initial article) has now been distributed more widely. While on the evening
of February 8, some high up in the UN blamed Inner City Press for its release, a
copy was given to a UN office on request, and then reappeared in the hands of
another reported.
Following Inner City Press'
February 5 exclusive, at the following day's
noon briefing,
Ban Ki-moon's spokeswoman faced questions about the report, which she didn't yet
have. On February 7, Inner City Press
asked the
spokeswoman about the
OIOS audit,
which names individuals that still work for the Pension Fund actually, that was
recommended that action be taken. We understand that Burnham, Chris Burnham,
before he left asked that the action be taken. I don’t know if Ms. Barcena has
followed-up on that? What’s going to happen with that? ... overall, what the
Secretary-General is going to do about outsourcing the pension; and number two,
is there any follow-up to the OIOS investigation?
Spokesperson: ... the Secretary-General has not reacted yet, nor has Ms.
Barcena, who, as I said earlier this week, is coming back from her trip to
Nairobi. And she should be coming to speak to you when she gets back. She has
accepted to come and respond to your questions.
To not simply await the
promised opportunity to question Ms. Barcena, which Inner City Press has been
told will be on February 12, Inner City Press also on Wednesday
asked the
Special Assistant to the Spokesman for the GA President, Frehiwot Bekele, the
following:
Inner City
Press: The Staff Pension Fund reports to the GA, is a creature of the GA in
relationship to it. So, I’m wondering, there’s been an OIOS investigative
report that has been titled 'Conflict of Interest, Favoritism and Mismanagement
in the UN Staff Pension Fund.' I’m wondering if this was ever turned over to
the GA, and if the GA has taken action on it.
Special
Assistant: I’m not aware. I can try to find out.
Inner City
Press: I’d appreciate that.
On Thursday morning, Mr. Bekele told
Inner City Press that since the OIOS report hadn't been given a formal number to
be released, the Secretary-General's Spokesperson's office would be responding,
which they did, requesting a copy of the report and then sending the following
response:
Subject: Your
question on OIOS and the Pension Fund
From:
[Spokesperson's Office at] un.org
To: Inner City
Press
Sent: Thu, 8
Feb 2007
In March 2006,
the OIOS completed an investigation into allegations of possible conflict of
interest, favoritism and mismanagement at the United Nations Joint Staff Pension
Fund. Based upon the evidence adduced, OIOS concluded that several staff members
- including two Senior UNJSPF staff - have acted improperly in connection to
contracts for information technology services awarded to a consultant retained
by UNJSPF.
OIOS issued
several recommendations in this case, including that UNJSPF management take
appropriate action against its two staff. The Chief Executive Officer of UNJSPF
informed OIOS that he disagrees with the findings and recommendations of the
report of investigation - as regards the actions of his staff - and advised that
he "intends to take no action" with regard to them. OIOS advised him that
pursuant to its mandate, it will report his response to the General Assembly.
Pursuant to
General Assembly resolution 59/272, the report is available to Member States
upon request. It has already been released, in redacted form, to two Member
States who have requested it.
Who, you ask, are these unnamed Member
States? And what will they be doing? Watch this site.
Other Inner City Press
reports are available in the ProQuest service and some are archived on
www.InnerCityPress.com --
At the UN,
Mysterious Deletion from Iran Sanctions List of Aerospace Industries
Organization Goes Unexplained
At the UN, Iran
Resolution Passes 15-0 Amid Media Frenzy While Somalia and UN Reform Are
Ignored
At the UN,
Security Council and GA Games and Holiday Spirit As Revolving Door Ban
Disappears on Final Day
UNDP Not Covered
By Weak UN Post-Employment Restrictions, Dervis and Mizsei and Aid to
the Scapegoated
UN
Post-Employment Restriction Are Watered Down for Senior Officials,
Comparison to June Draft Reveals
At the UN, Curt
Eulogies for Dictator, Revolving Door and Budget Left for the Last Day
UNDP's Dervis
Backtracks on Transparency, Promises Accounting of Funds, Denies Role in
Uganda Abuse
At the UN,
Jeffrey Sachs Answers the $75,000 Question But Not on UNDP, Still
Laudable Goals for 2025
Burundi Spin
at the UN, Amid Coup Trial and Ceasefire Not Implemented, Great Lakes
Commission Moves In
At the UN, Iran
Resolution Goes Blue as Ivory Coast is Traded Away With No Follow-up on
Hmung
At the UN,
Annan's Long Goodbye, With Oil for Food in the Air and Hothouse Musical
Chairs
At Kofi Annan's
Farewell, UNDP Transparency is Raised, and Brian Gleeson Steps Up
At UN
in Beirut, Dueling Charges of Job-Trading and
Tax-Evasion, the Burden of
Mervat Tallawy, Retaliation from Below
UNDP Will Be
Called to Greater Transparency, Says President of Spain, on UNDP's
Board, and Flaws of UNOPS
UNDP's Ad
Melkert Says He Will Finally Increase Transparency, Describes Fraud in
Russia, Dodges Uganda
In Eastern
Congo, Kidnapper of UN Peacekeepers Is Made a Colonel, Clooney And Now
Guehenno Might Stay
At the UN,
Ocampo 1 Says Kony To Jail and Ocampo 2 Sees No Serious Bertucci
Charges, Dueling Parties
In UNDP's Book,
Strong's Scandals Are Missing, While Workers Complain, MMB Schmoozes the
Korean Mission
At UNDP, Flighty
Rhetoric Founders in Mismanagement, MMB's Net, a Genocidaire and Whither
ECOSOC
At the UN,
Disabled Are Freed from a Footnote, Murky Answers from Gbagbo to Kosovo
to a Genocidaire
Countering UN's
Vanity Press, UNDP Histories from Below, Brussels and Two Views of Omar
Bakhet
At the UN,
Indigenous Indignation, Revolving Door Mysteries and Peace Pipe
Belatedly Smoked
At the UN,
Questions of Congo Mass Graves and Kazana, Mugabe and Forests and Rich
German Ships
UNDP Is
Important For The Poor, and Therefore Must Be Made Transparent
As UN
Speechifies, UNDP Audits Are Still Being Withheld, While War in Somalia
and Sudan, Pronk Blogs On
Waste, Fraud and
Abuse at UNDP in Vietnam, While UN Secretariat Urges Censorship
At the UN,
Questions of Humanitarian Aid and Congo Body Count, Despots' Crackdown
on Dissent
In UNDP,
Questions of Money Wasted, Neutrality Trampled, Russian Office Audits
Withheld and Sachs Expenses
From Baidoa
to the UN, Denials on Ethiopian Troops Being in Somalia, Resolution Is
Passed
Retaliation
Found at UNDP, While Dervis Is Focused on Turkey, In Two Weeks Will Take
Questions
Annan's
Spokesman Silent on 150 Dead in Congo, War in Somalia - But in Loud
Defense of UNDP's $567,000 Book
At the UN,
Interlopers into Somalia Are Discussed, With Chadian Pull-Back,
Peacekeepers and Uganda's Karamoja
UNDP Spent
$567,000 on Book to Praise Itself, While the Well-Placed Feed Off UNDP's
Core Budget and Prime Postings
As UNDP Questions
Mount, Mark Malloch Brown Calls Them Irresponsible, Answers Only in
Vanity Press
In UNDP Series,
Questions of Jeffrey Sachs and Associates Payments, From $1 to $75,000
From Sleaze in
Vietnam to Fights in DC-1, UNDP Appears Out of Control at the Top
On Somalia,
Past Arms Embargo Violations Forgiven in Zeal to Contain Islamic Courts
In UNDP, Drunken
Mis-Managers on the Make Praised and Protected, Meet UNDP's Kalman
Mizsei
From Violent
Disarmament in Uganda to the National Bank of Serbia, UNDP Leaves Others
to Answer for It
UNDP Sources Say
Dervis Fires Malloch Brown-linked Officials, Then Offers Hush-Up Jobs
On Somalia, Fiji
and Oil-for-Food, UN Ambiguity Leads to Hypocrisy and Corruption
At the UN,
Indigenous Rights Get Deferred, As U.S. Abstains, Deftly or Deceptively
At the UN,
Threat and Possible Statement on Fiji Spotlights Selection and Payment
of UN Peacekeepers
At the UN, China
and Islamic Dev't Bank Oppose Soros and World Bank On How to Fight
Poverty
At the UN,
Misdirection on Somalia and Myanmar, No Answers from UNDP's Kemal Dervis
UNDP Dodges
Questions of Disarmament Abuse in Uganda and of Loss of Togo AIDS Grant,
Dhaka Snafu
At the UN, The
Swan Song of Jan Egeland and the Third Committee Loop, Somalia Echoes
Congo
UN Silent As
Protesters Tear Gassed in Ivory Coast, As UNMOVIC Plods On and War
Spreads in Somalia
In the UN,
Uzbekistan Gets a Pass on Human Rights As Opposition to U.S. Grows and
War's On in Somalia
At the UN,
Cluster Bombs Unremembered, Uighurs Disappeared and Jay-Z Returns with
Water -- for Life
From the UN,
Silence on War Crimes Enforcement and Conflicts of Interest on Complaint
from Bahrain
En Route to
Deutsche Bank, the UN's Door Revolves, While Ban Ki-moon Arrives and
Moldova Spins
As Two UN
Peacekeepers Are Killed, UN Says Haiti's Improving, Ban Ki-moon on
Zimbabwe?
Nagorno-Karabakh President Disputes Fires and Numbers, Oil and UN, in
Exclusive Interview with Inner City Press
Inside the UN,
Blaming Uganda's Victims, Excusing Annan on Mugabe, and U.S. Blocked
Darfur Trip
U.S. Blocked
Council's Trip to Darfur Meeting, Brazzaville Envoy Explains After U.S.
Casts a Veto
At the UN,
Council Works Overtime To Cancel Its Trip About Darfur, While DC Muses
on John Bolton
UN Panel's
"Coherence" Plan Urges More Power to UNDP, Despite Its Silence on Human
Rights
On Water, UNDP
Talks Human Rights, While Enabling Violations in Africa and Asia, With
Shell and Coca-Cola
Will UN's
Revolving Door Keep Human Rights Lost, Like Bush's Call and WFP
Confirmation Questions?
On Somalia,
We Are All Ill-Informed, Says the UN, Same on Uganda, Lurching Toward
UNDP Power Grab
On WFP, Annan and
Ban Ki-Moon Hear and See No Evil, While Resume of Josette Sheeran Shiner
Is Edited
Would Moon
Followers Trail Josette Sheeran Shiner into WFP, As to U.S. State Dep't?
At the UN,
Positions Are Up For the Grabbing, Sun's Silence on Censorship, Advisor
Grabs for Gun
In WFP Race,
Josette Sheeran Shiner Praises Mega Corporations from Cornfield While
State Spins
At the UN,
Housing Subsidy Spin, Puntland Mysteries of UNDP and the Panama Solution
In Campaign to
Head UN WFP, A Race to Precedents' Depths, A Murky Lame Duck Appointment
At the UN,
Gbagbo and his Gbaggage, Toxic Waste and Congolese Sanctions
WFP Brochure-Gate? John Bolton Has Not Seen Brochure
of "Official" U.S. Candidate to Head World Food Program
Ivory Coast
Stand-Off Shows Security Council Fault Lines: News Analysis
At the UN,
It's Groundhog's Day on Western Sahara, Despite Fishing Deals and
Flaunting of the Law
"Official" U.S.
Candidate to Head WFP Circulates Brochure With Pulitzer Claim, UN Staff
Rules Ignored
Senegal's
President Claims Peace in Casamance and Habre Trial to Come, A Tale of
Two Lamines
A Tale of Two
Americans Vying to Head the World Food Program, Banbury and Sheeran
Shiner
At the UN, the Unrepentant Blogger Pronk, a Wink
on 14 North Korean Days and Silence on Somalia
At the UN,
Literacy Losses in Chad, Blogless Pronk and Toothless Iran Resolution,
How Our World Turns
Sudan Pans Pronk
While Praising Natsios, UN Silent on Haiti and WFP, Ivorian Fingers
Crossed
UN Shy on North
Korea, Effusive on Bird Flu and Torture, UNDP Cyprus Runaround, Pronk is
Summoned Home
At the UN,
Silence from UNDP on Cyprus, from France on the Chad-Bomb, Jan Pronk's
Sudan Blog
Russia's Vostok
Battalion in Lebanon Despite Resolution 1701, Assembly Stays Deadlocked
and UNDP Stays Missing
As
Turkmenistan Cracks Down on Journalists, Hospitals and Romance, UNDP Works
With the Niyazov Regime
At the UN,
Darfur Discussed, Annan Eulogized and Oil For Food Confined to a
Documentary Footnote
With All Eyes
on Council Seat, UN is Distracted from Myanmar Absolution and Congo
Conflagration
As Venezuela and
Guatemala Square Off, Dominicans In Default and F.C. Barcelona De-Listed
At the UN, North
Korea Sanctions Agreed On, Naval Searches and Murky Weapons Sales
At the UN,
Georgia Speaks of Ethnic Cleansing While Russia Complains of Visas
Denied by the U.S.
At the UN,
Deference to the Congo's Kabila and Tank-Sales to North Korea, of
Slippery Eels and Sun Microsystems
At the UN,
Annan's Africa Advisor Welcome Chinese Investment, Dodges Zimbabwe, Nods
to Darfur
At the UN,
Richard Goldstone Presses Enforcement on Joseph Kony, Reflecting Back on
Karadzic
UN Defers on
Anti-Terror Safeguards to Member States, Even in Pakistan and Somalia
Afghanistan
as Black Hole for Info and Torture Tales, Photos and Talk Mogadishu, the
UN Afterhours
Amid UN's Korean
Uproar, Russia Silent on Murder of Anna Politkovskaya, Chechnya Exposer
UN Envoy Makes
Excuses for Gambian Strongman, Whitewashing Fraud- and Threat-Filled
Election
Sudan's UN
Envoy Admits Right to Intervene in Rwanda, UNICEF Response on Terrorist
Groups in Pakistan
At the UN, As
Next S-G is Chosen, Annan Claims Power to Make 5-Year Appointments,
Quiet Filing and Ivory Coast Concessions
Chaos in UN's
Somalia Policy, Working With Islamists Under Sanctions While Meeting
with Private Military Contractors
U.S. Candidate
for UN's World Food Program May Get Lame Duck Appointment, Despite
Korean Issues
At the
UN, U.S. Versus Axis of Airport, While Serge Brammertz Measures
Non-Lebanese Teeth
Exclusion from
Water Is Called Progress, of Straw Polls and WFP Succession
William Swing
Sings Songs of Congo's Crisis, No Safeguards on Coltan Says Chairman of
Intel
Warlord in the
Waldorf and Other Congo Questions Dodged by the UN in the Time Between
Elections
In Some New
Orleans, Questions Echo from the South Bronx and South Lebanon
In New Orleans,
While Bone Is Thrown in Superdome, Parishes Still In Distress
At the UN, Tales
of Media Muzzled in Yemen, Penned in at the Waldorf on Darfur, While
Copters Grounded
US's Frazer
Accuses Al-Bashir of Sabotage, Arab League of Stinginess, Chavez of
Buying Leaders -
Click
here for
video file by Inner City Press.
Third Day of UN
General Debate Gets Surreal, Canapes and Killings, Questions on Iran and
Montenegro and Still Somalia
On Darfur, Hugo
Chavez Asks for More Time to Study, While Planning West Africa Oil
Refinery
At the UN, Ivory
Coast Discussed Without Decision on Toxic Politics, the Silence of
Somalia
Evo Morales
Blames Strike on Mobbed-Up Parasites, Sings Praise of Coca Leaf and Jabs
at Coca-Cola
Musharraf Says
Unrest in Baluchistan Is Waning, While Dodging Question on Restoring
Civilian Rule
At the UN, Cyprus
Confirms 'Paramilitary' Investigation, Denies Connection to Def Min
Resignation, CBTB Update
A Tale
of Three Leaders, Liberia Comes to Praise and Iran and Sudan to Bury the UN
UN Round-up:
Poland's President Says Iraq Is Ever-More Tense While Amb. Bolton Talks
Burmese Drugs, Spin on Ivory Coast
As UN's Annan
Now Says He Will Disclose, When and Whether It Will Be to the Public and
Why It Took So Long Go Unasked
At the UN,
Stonewalling Continues on Financial Disclosure and Letter(s) U.S.
Mission Has, While Zimbabwe Goes Ignored
At the UN,
Financial Disclosure Are Withheld While Freedom of Information Is
Promised, Of Hollywood and Dictators' Gift Shops
UN's Annan Says
Dig Into Toxic Dumping, While Declining to Discuss Financial Disclosure
A Still-Unnamed
Senior UN Official in NY Takes Free Housing from His Government,
Contrary to UN Staff Regulations
UN Admits To
Errors in its Report on Destruction of Congolese Village of Kazana,
Safeguards Not In Place
As UN Checks
Toxins in Abidjan, the Dumper Trafigura Figured in Oil for Food Scandal,
Funded by RBS and BNP Paribas
Targeting of
African Americans For High Cost Mortgages Grew Worse in 2005, While Fed
Downplays Its Own Findings
The UN and
Nagorno-Karabakh: Flurries of Activity Leave Frozen Conflicts Unchanged;
Updates on Gaza, Gavels and Gbagbo
The UN Cries
Poor on Lawless Somalia, While Its Ex-Security Chief Does Business
Through Ruleless Revolving Door
At the UN,
Micro-States Simmer Under the Assembly's Surface, While Incoming Council
President Dodges Most Questions
"Horror Struck"
is How UN Officials Getting Free Housing from Governments Would Leave
U.S., Referral on Burma But Not Uzbekistan
Security Council
President Condemns UN Officials Getting Free Housing from Governments,
While UK "Doesn't Do It Any More"
At the UN,
Incomplete Reforms Allow for Gifts of Free Housing to UN Officials by
Member States
Rare UN Sunshine
From If Not In Chad While Blind on Somalia and Zimbabwe, UNDP With Shell
in its Ear on Nigeria
Annan Family
Ties With Purchaser from Compass, Embroiled in UN Scandal, Raise
Unanswered Ethical Questions
At the UN, from
Casamance to Transdniestria, Kosovars to Lezgines, Micro-States as
Powerful's Playthings
Inquiry Into
Housing Subsidies Contrary to UN Charter Goes Ignored for 8 Weeks, As
Head UN Peacekeeper Does Not Respond
On the UN -
Corporate Beat, Dow Chemical Luncheon Chickens Come Home to Roost
Stop Bank
Branch Closings and Monopolies in the Katrina Zone, Group Says,
Challenging Regions- AmSouth Merger
Ship-Breakers
Missed by UN's Budget for Travel and Consultants in Bangladesh, Largest
UNIFIL Troop Donor
With Somalia on
the Brink of Horn-Wide War, UN Avoids Question of Ethiopian Invasion
In UN's Lebanon
Frenzy, Darfur Is Ignored As Are the Disabled, "If You Crave UNIFIL,
Can't You Make Do With MONUC?"
UN Decries
Uzbekistan's Use of Torture, While Helping It To Tax and Rule; Updates
on UNIFIL and UNMIS Off-Message
On Lebanon,
Russian Gambit Focuses Franco-American Minds, Short Term Resolution Goes
Blue Amid Flashes of Lightening
Africa Can Solve
Its Own Problems, Ghanaian Minister Tells Inner City Press, On LRA Peace
Talks and Kofi Annan's Views
At the UN, Jay-Z
Floats Past Questions on Water Privatization and Sweatshops, Q'Orianka
Kilcher in the Basement
In the UN
Security Council, Speeches and Stasis as Haiti is Forgotten, for a
Shebaa Farms Solution?
UN Knew of Child
Soldier Use by Two Warlords Whose Entry into Congo Army the UN
Facilitated
Impunity's in
the Air, at the UN in Kinshasa and NY, for Kony and Karim and MONUC for
Kazana
UN Still Silent
on Somalia, Despite Reported Invasion, In Lead-Up to More Congo Spin
UN's Guehenno
Says Congo Warlord Just Needs Training, and Kazana Probe Continues
With Congo
Elections Approaching, UN Issues Hasty Self-Exoneration as Annan Is
Distracted
In DR Congo, UN
Applauds Entry into Army of Child-Soldier Commander Along with Kidnapper
Spinning the
Congo, UN Admits Hostage Deal with Warlord That Put Him in Congolese
Army
At the UN, Dow
Chemical's Invited In, While Teaming Up With Microsoft is Defended
Kofi Annan
Questioned about Congolese Colonel Who Kidnapped Seven UN Soldiers
UN Silent As
Congolese Kidnapper of UN Peacekeepers Is Made An Army Colonel: News
Analysis
UN's Guehenno
Speaks of "Political Overstretch" Undermining Peacekeeping in Lower
Profile Zones
In Gaza Power
Station, the Role of Enron and the U.S. Government's OPIC Revealed by UN
Sources
UN's Corporate
Partnerships Will Be Reviewed, While New Teaming Up with Microsoft, and
UNDP Continues
BTC Briefing,
Like Pipeline, Skirts Troublespots, Azeri Revelations
Conflicts of
Interest in UNHCR Program with SocGen and Pictet Reveal Reform Rifts
UN Grapples with
Somalia, While UNDP Funds Mugabe's Human Rights Unit, Without
Explanation
UN Gives Mugabe
Time with His Friendly Mediator, Refugees Abandoned
At the UN,
Friday Night's Alright for Fighting; Annan Meets Mugabe
UN Acknowledges
Abuse in Uganda, But What Did Donors Know and When? Kazakh Questions
In Uganda, UNDP
to Make Belated Announcement of Program Halt, But Questions Remain (and
see
The New Vision,
offsite).
Disarmament
Abuse in Uganda Leads UN Agency to Suspend Its Work and Spending
Disarmament
Abuse in Uganda Blamed on UNDP, Still Silent on Finance
Alleged Abuse in
Disarmament in Uganda Known by UNDP, But Dollar Figures Still Not Given:
What Did UN Know and When?
Strong Arm on
Small Arms: Rift Within UN About Uganda's Involuntary Disarmament of
Karamojong Villages
UN's Selective
Vision on Somalia and Wishful Thinking on Uighurs
UN Habitat
Predicts The World Is a Ghetto, But Will Finance Be Addressed at
Vancouver World Urban Forum?
UN's Annan
Concerned About Use of Terror's T-Word to Repress, Wants
Freedom of Information
UN Waffles on
Human Rights in Central Asia and China; ICC on Kony and a Hero from
Algiers
UN & US,
Transparency for Finance But Not Foreign Affairs: Somalia, Sovereignty
and Senator Tom Coburn
Human Rights
Forgotten in UN's War of Words, Bolton versus Mark Malloch Brown: News
Analysis
In Praise of
Migration, UN Misses the Net and Bangalore While Going Soft on Financial
Exclusion
UN Sees Somalia
Through a Glass, Darkly, While Chomsky Speaks on Corporations and
Everything But Congo
Corporate Spin on
AIDS, Holbrooke's Kudos to Montenegro and its Independence
The Silence of
the Congo and Naomi Watts; Between Bolivia and the World Bank
Human Rights
Council Has Its Own Hanging Chads; Cocky U.S. State Department Spins
from SUVs
Child Labor and
Cargill and Nestle; Iran, Darfur and WHO's on First with Bird Flu
Press Freedom?
Editor Arrested by Congo-Brazzaville, As It Presides Over Security
Council
The
Place of the Cost-Cut UN in Europe's Torn-Up Heart;
Deafness to Consumers, Even by the Greens
Background Checks
at the UN, But Not the Global Compact; Teaching Statistics from
Turkmenbashi's Single Book
Ripped Off Worse
in the Big Apple, by Citigroup and Chase: High Cost Mortgages Spread in
Outer Boroughs in 2005, Study Finds
Burundi: Chaos at
Camp for Congolese Refugees, Silence from UNHCR, While Reform's Debated
by Forty Until 4 AM
The Chadian
Mirage: Beyond French Bombs, Is Exxon In the Cast? Asylum and the
Uzbeks, Shadows of Stories to Come
Through the UN's
One-Way Mirror, Sustainable Development To Be Discussed by Corporations,
Even Nuclear Areva
Racial
Disparities Grew Worse in 2005 at Citigroup, HSBC and Other Large Banks
Mine Your Own
Business: Explosive Remnants of War and the Great Powers, Amid the
Paparazzi
Human Rights Are
Lost in the Mail: DR Congo Got the Letter, But the Process is Still
Murky
Iraq's Oil to be
Metered by Shell, While Basrah Project Remains Less than Clear
Kofi, Kony,
Kagame and Coltan: This Moment in the Congo and Kampala
As Operation
Swarmer Begins, UN's Qazi Denies It's Civil War and Has No Answers if
Iraq's Oil is Being Metered
Cash Crop: In
Nepal, Bhutanese Refugees Prohibited from Income Generation Even in
their Camps
The Shorted and
Shorting in Humanitarian Aid: From Davos to Darfur, the Numbers Don't
Add Up
UN Reform:
Transparency Later, Not Now -- At Least Not for AXA - WFP Insurance
Contract
In the Sudanese
Crisis, Oil Revenue Goes Missing, UN Says
Empty Words on
Money Laundering and Narcotics, from the UN and Georgia
What is the Sound
of Eleven Uzbeks Disappearing? A Lack of Seats in Tashkent, a Turf War
at UN
Kosovo: Of
Collective Punishment and Electricity; Lights Out on Privatization of
Ferronikeli Mines
Abkhazia:
Cleansing and (Money) Laundering, Says Georgia
Post-Tsunami
Human Rights Abuses, including by UNDP in the Maldives
Citigroup
Dissembles at United Nations Environmental Conference
Other Inner City Press
reports are available in the ProQuest service and some are archived on
www.InnerCityPress.com --
Copyright 2006 Inner City Press, Inc. To request
reprint or other permission, e-contact Editorial [at] innercitypress.com - phone: (718) 716-3540
