Inner City Press: Investigative Reporting from the United Nations

In Sudan, UN Council Will Bypass Darfur, Of Juba Hotels & Abyei Agreements

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, May 9 -- When UN Security Council members travel to Sudan later this month, they will not go to Darfur.

Council president for May Gerard Araud of France told Inner City Press on Monday that the members definitely will go to Abyei, they are just figuring out which airport to use.

From the French Mission to the UN's transcript:

Inner City Press: On the trip, has Sudan agreed that the Security Council goes to Abyei ?

Araud: Sudan has agreed to the visit to Abyei. There is no problem. We are discussing the technical organisation i.e to which airport we are going.

But Sudan's diplomat outside the Council on Monday told Inner City Press that Khartoum hasn't yet approved any trip to Abyei. “We have to see the Terms of Reference,” he said.

Another Council member agreed that Sudan had not yet consented. “The President of the Council will have to speak with Sudan about it,” the diplomat said. But Araud said it is already set.

The concern about Abyei includes security. Two Council members told Inner City Press that the Department of Peacekeeping Operations says that they can safety get the members to Abyei “for now.” They discussed two “rapid reaction” teams of Indian peacekeepers.

There was also discussion, sources say, of hotel accommodations in Juba. On the Council's last trip there on October, which Inner City Press reported on, the delegation was split up into two hotels. (Click here for Inner City Press' review of the Beijing Juba hotel, essentially trailers with the Chinese consulate behind it).

This time, there have been complaints about double standards or disparate treatment. All Council members must be treated the same, it'd been agreed. Watch this site.

* * *

UN Council Will Not Travel to Darfur, Meeting Gambari Outside Sudan, Doha Process "Collapsing"

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, May 3 -- When the UN Security Council travels to Africa and Sudan later this month, it will not be going to Darfur. Inner City Press on Tuesday asked the Council President for May, Gerard Araud of France, if this reflects that France or the Council believes that the continued killing in Darfur is less important that before.

Araud answered largely in terms of Sudan's North - South process, and the apparent need to convince Khartoum to allow the UN to keep a peacekeeping presence in the North. He said that “Abyei, Southern Kordofan and Blue Nile” are still hot spots.

Finally, Araud acknowledged that “the Doha process is more or less collapsing." But why then is there no successor for Djibril Bassole, who stepped down as Doha mediator on April 30 to return to Burkina Faso as foreign minister?

Araud said, “Darfur, we are not going to avoid the problem. We will be in Khartoum, and raise to the authorities. We will meet [Darfur peacekeeping chief Ibrahim] Gambari, by chance, in Nairobi.”

But many feel that Gambari as head of UNAMID is not investigating or reporting on, much less stopping, the government's military and anti-humanitarian moves in Darfur.

Araud and Cote d'Ivoire PR Bamba, focus on Darfur not shown

In just the past few days, Inner City Press has asked the UN about these claims, without answer. On April 28, Inner City Press asked:

Inner City Press: the Justice and Equality Movement has alleged that the Government has began using land mines in North Darfur. And they say that they have asked UNAMID [African Union-United Nations Hybrid Operation in Darfur] to go and remove them or to verify them there. It’s been out for about 36 hours, this story, and I wonder: has UNAMID reacted to that? Is it true? Is it not true? What’s UNAMID doing about this?

Acting Deputy Spokesperson Farhan Haq: Well, we don’t have any immediate reaction from UNAMID to this. Of course, demining is one of the tasks that UN missions tend to take once we have the ability and the mandate to do so. But I don’t have any particular reaction on…

Inner City Press: I’m sorry, they are saying that these are newly planted mines, that they are not old remnants of war, that, in fact, the Government is planting mines, and so I am just wondering, is that the kind of thing that UNAMID would go and check out?

Acting Deputy Spokesperson Haq: Well, first we would have to collect information to make sure that there is… we are always aware of reports from either side about different types of conflict or militarization, and then, first we would need to check those out. If there are mines in place, we would take action to make sure that they would be demined.

Five days later, even after Inner City Press reiterated the question to a Department of Peacekeeping Operations spokesman outside a French-sponsored session about the Democratic Republic of the Congo, there is no answer.

On May 3, Inner City Press asked Ban Ki-moon's spokesman:

Inner City Press: there have been two separate reports of children dying in IDP [internally displaced persons] camps in Darfur due to, they say, lack of medical care, the residents of the camps. One is in the well-known Khor Omer camp, the other one is Mershing camp. And I am just wondering how to square with this, I saw a recent UN News Centre, UN press release, about increased humanitarian access. Is this… I mean, is UNAMID [African Union-UN Hybrid Operation in Darfur] aware of people dying in camps due to lack of medical care and if so, what is being done to gain access to those camps?

Spokesperson Nesirky: I’ll ask my colleagues in DPKO [Department of Peacekeeping Operations] to provide an update.

But when will the promised updates arrive? Inner City Press also asked Araud about the UN continuing to fly Ahmed Haroun, indicted by the International Criminal Court for war crimes in Darfur, to Abyei, after France's demarche and then more alleged murders in South Kordofan. Araud did not answer this part of the question. Watch this site.

* * *

UN Admits 2d Flight of ICC Darfur Indictee Haroun to Abyei in Sudan, Impunity

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, March 4, updated -- The UN has for a second time offered a free UN flight in Sudan to Ahmed Haroun, under indictment by the International Criminal Court for war crimes in Darfur, the UN admitted Friday in response to questions from Inner City Press.

On March 3 the UN Security Council met about renewed fighting in the disputed Abyei region. Back in January, Inner City Press got the UN to acknowledge they had flown ICC indictee Haroun from South Kordofan, where he serves fellow ICC indictee Omar al Bashir as governor, to Abyei.

The UN has defended this controversial flight by saying that Haroun and Haroun alone could stop violence in Abyei. The UN never explained why the government of Sudan, which has an air force currently bombing civilians in Jebel Marra in Darfur, couldn't itself fly Haroun.

The UN said it was a scheduled flight, then UN Mission in Sudan chief Haile Menkerios admitted to Inner City Press that it was a special flight. Inner City Press is told such flights cost $40,000, and the UN has confirm no reimbursement has been sought from the Bashir government.

But now the violence has continued, making the UN flight of ICC indictee Haroun harder to justify even by the UN's own argument.

March 3 in front of the Security Council, Inner City Press asked Council president for March Li Baodong of China if the UN Peacekeeping official who briefed the Council, Atul Khare, had mentioned if Haroun would again be flown in a UN helicopter. Li Baodong did not directly answer.

At the March 4 UN noon briefing, Inner City Press asked Secretary General Ban Ki-moon's spokesman Martin Nesirky to confirm or deny that that the UN would once again fly ICC indictee Haroun to Abyei, even now that his work in connection with the first flight has proved ineffective.

Nesirky said he would check. Ten minutes later, Nesirky's deputy Farhan Haq announced by speaker to all UN correspondents that yes, Haroun attended today's meeting in Abyei, and yes, “he was transported” by the UN.

This UN promotes impunity, even for one of the few people indicted for war crimes by the ICC. Meanwhile Ban Ki-moon brags about the Security Council's partial referral of the situation in Libya to the ICC -- a referral that Ban Ki-moon did not even call for until after the Council voted to make the referral.

This UN is promoting and enshrining lawlessness, with no transparency or accountability. Watch this site.

Update of 3:48 pm -- Human Rights Watch, via Richard Dicker, submitted this comment:

“This is the second time in recent weeks the UN has transported Ahmed Haroun who is charged by the ICC with war crimes in Darfur. We have real concerns because the U.N. should not be in the business of transporting Haroun. There needs to be an extremely high threshold of urgency for such action by UNMIS.”

Responses have been sought from the Missions to the UN of France, the UK and the US, with the latter two asked if they knew in advance of the UN's new flight of ICC indictee Haroun. Given her statements this year about social media, & after hours of non-response by the US Mission to the UN,@AmbassadorRice has been asked directly as well. Watch this site.

Update of 4:30 pm -- Then this, from UK Mission to the UN spokesman Daniel Shepherd:

“As spokesperson, I would only reiterate the message that my two Ambassadors have both said on the record (and published by Inner City Press) first time around: that we aren’t going to second guess how UNMIS fulfills its mandate to provide good offices to the Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA) parties in efforts to resolve differences through dialogue and negotiations. I’d only add that this work is particularly important at this sensitive time, to contain any potential escalation after the recent Abyei violence.”

We could note again that violence has persisted despite the UN flying ICC indictee Ahmed Haroun in the first time, and that it is the role of UN member states to oversee the UN Secretariat, not to defer in this case to what some see as its promotion of impunity - but at least the UK would put its position on the record.

Update of 4:43 pm -- this too has come in, perhaps in response:

Date: Fri, Mar 4, 201
Subject: Haroun and Abyei
To: Matthew.Lee [at] innercitypress.com

You guys ask great questions! Have you noticed perhaps that the United Nations seems to be unaware of who is causing the violence in Abyei. And yet "diplomatic sources" report seeing the burial of 33 bodies - all southerners.

The Arab nomads say the violence started when SPLM police shot at them (Hitler used a similar ploy to invade Poland) - and today thousands of civilians fled Abyei fearing another crisis like in June 2008. The Dinka Ngok villages north of Abyei, such as Maker, have been burnt to the ground. The end explains the means. There is a creeping ethnic cleansing going on in the Abyei region despite the agreements of 2005 and the Court of Arbitration ruling in 2010.

Why fly Haroun to Abyei - what is his cv? It is, as you correctly point out, that of arming arab militias to burn villages. I hope to see more of your questions pinning the UN to the responsibility to protect.

Click for Mar 1, '11 BloggingHeads.tv re Libya, Sri Lanka, UN Corruption

These reports are usually also available through Google News and on Lexis-Nexis.

Click here for a Reuters AlertNet piece by this correspondent about Uganda's Lord's Resistance Army. Click here for an earlier Reuters AlertNet piece about the Somali National Reconciliation Congress, and the UN's $200,000 contribution from an undefined trust fund. Video Analysis here

Other, earlier Inner City Press are listed here, and some are available in the ProQuest service, and now on Lexis-Nexis.

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