UNITED
NATIONS, May
30 -- This UN
found a way to
waste money
and fool
people
even amid the
hoopla about
the release of
its
anti-poverty
Post-2015
High Level
Panel report
on May 30.
Inner
City Press
dutifully
covered the
12:30 John
Podesta press
conference
on the report,
and published
on it right at
the 3 pm
embargo.
Secretary
General Ban
Ki-moon issued
statements as
did many of
the
Panel's
members and
their
governments.
Then
just before 5
pm an e-mail
came in headed
"PRESS
RELEASE: UN
RESPONSE TO
NEW REPORT BY
PANEL LED BY
DAVID
CAMERON."
It
seemed a bit
strange, the
UN responding
to what is in
a sense a UN
report. The
sender was not
the UN or one
of its
agencies but
rather a
corporate
public
relations
firm, Portland
Communications.
Their
clients
include
Medicapital
Bank, CBS and
Maersk.
In
this case,
they were paid
to put out a
press release
for a UN
agency,
the UN
Population
Fund or UNFPA.
This agency,
of course, has
its own
paid public
relations
staff, one of
whom is listed
on the bottom
of
the press
release. So
why pay an
outside firm?
Perhaps
because
of this, the
header is
misleading.
UNFPA knows or
should know
it cannot
speak for "the
UN." What if
another agency
--
UNDP, or the
Office of the
High
Commissioner
for Human
Rights, say --
has another
view?
So
why waste this
money, on the
UN praising
itself?
This
on the same
day
when the chief
of UN
Peacekeeping
Herve Ladsous,
who
has at least
three
spokespeople,
chose for the
first time not
to put out a
transcript of
his press
conference of
May 29,
when he
outright
refused to
answer a
question from
Inner City
Press about
mass rape in
the Congo by
the UN's
partners in
the Congolese
Army. Video
here.
Instead,
as
if it couldn't
afford to do a
transcript
despite the
three
spokespeople,
DPKO used only
a "summary,"
which did not
mention
Minova, the
rapes, the
question or
that Ladsous
refused to
answer. Where
is this UN
going? Watch
this site.
, 
