By
Matthew
Russell Lee,
Exclusive
UNITED
NATIONS,
December 10 --
On UN Security
Council
reform,
President of
the General
Assembly John
Ashe today
sent a "non-paper"
and letter
from San
Marino
ambassador Daniele
Bodini to Afghanistan's
Ambassador
Zahir Tanin as
chief of the
Inter-Governmental
Negotiations.
Inner City
Press has
obtained the
letters and
non-paper,
which are not
yet online on
the UN's
website, and publishes
them here.
Ashe's initial
letter in this
process did
not
immediately go
online either;
Inner City
Press published
it first.
(His office
said that was
a snafu not to
be repeated.)
Now this.
On December 2,
Ashe wrote and
put online a
letter naming
December 5 as
the beginning
of the "IGN"
under
Afghanistan
Permanent
Representative
Zahir Tanin,
and urging
flexibility
from states,
presumably
those groupings
of states
which
protested the
make-up and
mandate of
Ashe's
advisory group: Belgium,
San Marino,
Liechtenstein,
Sierra Leone,
Brazil and
Papua New
Guinea.
On Friday,
December 6
Inner City
Press was the
only
media staking
out a meeting
of the Advisory
Group,
including PGA
Ashe and his
colleague
Ambassador
Noel Sinclair,
in Conference
Room A in the
UN basement.
Brazil's
Ambassador
Patriota, when
Inner City
Press asked
if reform is just
around the
corner,
laughed and
said "but we
don't know how
far the corner
is."
Ashe
back on
November 6
tried to
assuage the
critics by
saying that,
contrary to
statements by
Brazil and
Germany in the
Security
Council debate
on Working
Methods, the
Group of Six
would neither
negotiate nor
draft.
Still,
France's
Deputy
Permanent
Representative
said France
looked forward
to the
Advisory Group
drafting.
Ashe
had to write
and go online
again,
canceling the
December 5
beginning of
Inter
Governmental
Negotiations
and putting it
back a week to
December 12.
Now Inner City
Press publishes
the non-paper
here.
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