Inner City Press: Investigative Reporting from the United Nations

Mogadishu To Manhattan, Somali Minister Lobbies UN for His Clan, Ignores TFG

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, December 22 -- As the UN Security Council on Wednesday authorized 4000 more AMISOM troops for Somalia, Inner City Press was told that the Transitional Federal Government's new foreign minister Mohamed Abdullahi Oomar has taken to writing his own letters to the UN to support members of his clan, without the approval of the president.

Inner City Press has already exclusively reported on the attempted re-entry into the Somali Mission to the UN of Idd Beddel Mohamed, who had been serving as Somalia's Deputy Permanent Representative to the UN until late 2009, when he was recalled to Mogadishu.

Idd Beddel Mohamed did not want to go to Mogadishu, and so went to Canada, knowledgeable sources say. But when Mohamed Abdullahi Oomar from his clan became foreign minister, Idd Beddel Mohamed came back to New York -- on what type of visa is not clear -- and showed up at the Mission, saying he was back.

When he refused to leave, the police were called to remove him.

Then Mohamed Abdullahi Oomar wrote to the UN, as foreign minister, stating that the current Permanent Representative is being called back to Mogadishu, and that Idd Beddel Mohamed should be treated as Ambassador.

Despite Ban Ki-moon's December 21 speech to the UN General Assembly asking their Credentials Committee to act on letters from Ouattara switching away from Gbagbo's Permanent Representative Djedje, normally the UN does not get into conflicts inside Missions to the UN, or between a country's president and foreign minister.

UN's Ban, President of Somalia & Foreign Minister of Turkey - Somali FM not shown

In this case, closely placed sources complain that Mohamed Abdullahi Oomar should never have written these letters, which they say were not authorized by the president. The upshot is that the government is in disarray, or still subject to clan fights, even as the TFG is supposed to end in 2011. What will come after it? Watch this site.

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As Former Somali Diplomat Is Barred from Mission to UN, Is UNICEF Barred by TFG? WFP Withholds MOU with IOC

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, December 15 -- As the UN World Food Program continues to withhold its Somalia Memorandum of Understanding with the Organization of the Islamic Conference, even from other UN officials, a once and perhaps future Somali diplomat has reportedly reappeared at the country's Mission to the UN and had the police called on him.

Idd Beddel Mohamed, who Inner City Press interviewed in 2007 as Deputy Permanent Representative denounced UN payments to warlords, recently came back to the Somali Mission, according to sources, saying that the new Foreign Minister Mohamed Abdullahi Oomar had authorized him to enter.

But the current Permanent Representative said he'd heard no such thing, the sources say, the police were called to oust Idd Beddel Mohamed.

Meanwhile, after both Mark Bowden, UN Resident and Humanitarian Coordinator for Somalia and Ms. Kiki Gbeho, Head of the Somalia Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs told Inner City Press they had not even seen WFP's agreement with the OIC, on December 14 Inner City Press asked OCHA chief Valerie Amos about it.

Ms. Amos answered that OCHA can't compel any UN system agency to “coordinate” with it. Video here.

Idd Beddel Mohamed previously at UN, ejection from Mission not shown

On December 15, Inner City Press asked UN spokesman Martin Nesirky if Secretary General Ban Ki-moon thought that UN system agencies should reach and withhold secret deals. Nesirky said he had nothing to add to what Mr. Bowden and Ms. Gbeho had said.

A WFP spokesperson has emailed offering to talk about the MOU and has been asked to provide a copy. He replied "I can't email the MOU to you." Watch this site.

Footnote: at the December 15 noon briefing, Inner City Press asked UN Spokesman Nesirky about reports that the Somali Transitional Federal Government has ordered UNICEF and other UN agencies to stop their work in Somalia, for missing a meeting about the drought.

Previously, Inner City Press asked UNICEF's spokesman, but he is out of the office for a long time (question have been backing up for the past two weeks). Nesirky said that events have moved on and that the Somali block is not (any longer?) in place. We'll see.

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.

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