By
Matthew
Russell Lee,
Follow Up to
Exclusive
UNITED
NATIONS,
October 15 --
On October 7
Inner City
Press
exclusively
reported that
a member of
the UN's
Somalia
Eritrea
Monitoring
Group Dinesh
Mahtani used
UN SEMG time
and letterhead
for unrelated
advocacy
regarding
Eritrea.
Mahtani's
letter was exclusively put
online here
by Inner City
Press.
On October 15,
the Somalia
and Eritrea
sanctions
committee chairman
Ambassador Oh
Joon of South
Korea, when
Inner City
Press asked of
Mahtani, said
no, “we didn’t
have a
discussion on
him. It’s been
taken care of,
I think.”
Taken care of.
Since October
8 not only
Reuters but
also Agence
France Presse
have retyped
copies of the
SEMG report
given to them
-- with no
mention of the
SEMG scandal
and
resignation
acknowledged
right in the
UN Press
Briefing Room
on October 8.
Isn't this
like
"reporting" on
a panel of
judges' ruling
without
mentioning
that one of
the judges
just resigned
after being
confronted
with a letter
he wrote about
the subject
matter of the
case?
On
October 15,
when the UN
Security
Council met behind
closed doors
about SEMG and
the report,
the bylined
scribe of
Reuters
Mahtani-less
story about
the report
stood briefly
in front of
the Council,
then left.
After an hour
and a half
when the
meeting ended,
Inner City
Press asked
the sanctions
committee
chairman Oh
Joon if
Mahtani and
his
resignation
has been
raised in the
meeting. No,
Oh Joon
replied, “we
didn’t have a
discussion on
him. It’s been
taken care of,
I think.”
But
some question
what the
chairman of
the SEMG knew,
and how the
involvement of
the
now-resigned
Mahtani in the
report under
review
impacted it.
We’ll have
more on this.
On
October 8,
Inner City
Press asked UN
Spokesman
Stephane
Dujarric about
Mahtani's
letter and if
it was
appropriate
behavior for a
sanctions
monitor.
No, Dujarric
said, adding
that the
letter was
“shown” to
Dinesh
Mahtani, who
has resigned.
Video
here.
On
October 10, Reuters
two UN
correspondents
dutifully regurgitated
the SEMG's
most recent
report, even
called it
"exclusive" --
a basis on
which Reuters
pays
-- with no
mention that
one of the
SEMG's members
had resigned
after being
exposed for
pushing regime
change.
Key fact: Dinesh
Mahtani used
to work for
Reuters, see
c.v. here.
This puts
Reuters'
non-mention of
SEMG member
Mahtani's
resignation is
a different
light.
On October 13,
AFP
in English
retyped its
copy of the
SEMG report,
no mention of
regime-change
scandal. This
too is how
the UN works,
or doesn't.
Sources
had
told Inner
City Press
that Mahtani,
the finance
expert on SEMG
and previously
on the DR
Congo
Sanctions
group, was
found
requesting
favors from a
member state,
to which the
SEMG reports.
Here
is a document:
a
letter from
Dinesh
Mahtani,
ostensibly in
his SEMG role,
saying that
former
Eritrean
official Ali
Abdu "has
great
potential to
play a
stabilizing
role in
Eritrea with
the country
possibly
headed to an
uncertain
period in its
history."
This
is hardly the
first
controversy in
the SEMG --
but usually
the members
wait until
they are off
or on their
way off the
Monitor Group
to “let it all
hang out,” as
one source put
it of previous
SEMG chair
Matt Bryden.
The current
chair, Jarat
Chopra, has
faced
complaints
from Somalia,
also exclusively
reported
by Inner City
Press.
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