"Secret"
Human Rights
Meeting of
UNSC Omits
Haiti &
Darfur,
Pillay Won't
Answer on
Abyei
By
Matthew
Russell Lee
UNITED
NATIONS,
Feb 7, update
Feb 8 -- When
human rights
was the topic
of a UN
Security
Council
meeting on
Tuesday
afternoon,
there was
barely any
notice to the
press.
Outside a low
key meeting of
the Council's
working group
on Children
& Armed
Conflict, a
topic on which
the
UN's top
expert is
being eased
out by Ban
Ki-moon, the
sole Permanent
Representative
in attendance
told Inner
City Press,
"I'm going
to the Arria
formula in the
North Lawn
about human
rights."
Minutes
later on
a windowless
corridor,
Inner City
Press found
the sign:
Security
Council, Arria
Formula,
Closed. After
a time German
Permanent
Representative
Peter Wittig
came out, and
informed Inner
City Press
that inside
there was
discussion of
four UN
missions,
including in
Iraq and
Afghanistan,
Liberia and
the Congo.
As
some other
Permanent
Representatives
left the
meeting,
though none
from the
Permanent Five
members, Inner
City Press
gleaned that
the meeting
was pushed by
Portugal,
which now also
chairs the
Council's
committee on
Working
Methods.
Here's a
suggestion: if
the Security
Council is
meeting
about human
rights, at
least put
notice in the
UN Journal.
Portugal's
Permanent
Representative
Cabral, to his
credit,
stopped to
answer
some questions
afterward,
about the four
missions which
presented in
the meeting.
He said the
right monitor
from Iraq, for
example, said
there is so
much fear, UN
staff don't
tell their
families they
are
working for
the UN.
Update:
Click here
for "press
lines" on the
meeting.
The
briefing on
the Congo,
Cabral said,
involved
natural
resources. On
that, beyond
the new NBA
connection,
there an Obama
administration
link. (Susan
Rice was not
at the
session; the
US mission
said she was
going on
CNN's
"Situation
Room" with
Wolf Blitzer
to talk about
Syria, but
the TV on
the North
Lawn's second
floor was
stuck on NY1
then kid's
cartoons.
Later the US
Mission to the
UN sent out this
link.)
But
again, why
these four
missions and
no more? Why
for example
not Haiti,
where
MINUSTAH
peacekeepers
are repeatedly
accused of
physical and
sexual
abuse? What
about AMISOM,
the mission in
Somalia which
the
Department of
Field Support
assists? Why
not UNAMID, or
the newer
Sudan - South
Sudan mission
in Abyei? Does
it even have a
human
rights
monitoring
component?
Inner
City Press
put this
question to
High
Commissioner
Navi Pillay
when she left
the
meeting. She
laughed but
did not
answer, while
a staffer
shook his
finger as if,
don't ask her
(or her New
York
representative
Mr.
Simonovic who
was with her)
any questions.
But aren't
they the UN's
rights
officials?
(c) UN Photo
Ban Ki-moon
& Navi
Pillay: 1 was
slow on Pibor,
the other
won't count
When last
questioned by
the Press,
Pillay said
there would be
a UN count of
the dead in
Jonglei state,
where the UN
reacted so
slowly. So
far, no count.
And no
answers.
If
these meetings
on human
rights, of
which there
are too few,
were open or
at least
not held in so
much secret,
these
questions
might be more
quickly
answered.
Watch this
site.
, 
