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UNITED
NATIONS, May 29 – There
are many ironies in the UN
system; Syria having become the
president of the UN Conference
on Disarmament on May 28 seems
one. On April 10 Inner City
Press went to the US State
Department briefing and asked
spokesperson Heather Nauert
about it. Video here
from 32:03. On May 29,
after it happened, Inner
City Press at the UN asked
the Ambassadors of the UK
and Sweden, video here.
The UK's Karen
Pierce called it grotesque but only
alphabetical; Sweden's Olof B.
Skoog said it hurts
the image of the UN
but nothing could be
done. But did UN
Secretary
General Antonio
Guterres, who
tried to have it
both ways (see
below) even try
to talk to
states and
finesse
something, as
happened for
example with
Sudan to chair a group
of UN ECOSOC?
On
April 16, Inner City Press asked the UN
Permanent Representative of Liechtenstein
about it; he said (Scope
here,
video here)
that he was
surprised (as was a
self-described
"UN resident correspondent"
to whom the UN
gives more access than
Inner City Press). But
unless these
surprised Ambassadors
actually do
something, the
alphabet will
rule: on
April 11, Inner City Press
asked UN Secretary General
Antonio Guterres' two top
spokesmen, "Given what the
Secretary General has said
about the reported use of
chemical weapons most recently
in Douma, what is his position
on, and what will he do about,
Syria being slated to become
President of the Conference on
Disarmament in May?" Deputy
Spokesman Farhan Haq replied
to Inner City Press (while not
responding to another UN
corruption question), "On
the disarmament question, our colleagues in
Geneva have shared the following: 'We can
confirm that, following the current
presidency of Switzerland, the Syrian Arab
Republic should serve as President of the
Conference as of 28 May 2018 for four weeks.
According to the Rules of Procedure ‘The
Presidency of the Conference shall rotate
among all its members; ... The rotation
which began in January 1979, based on the
English alphabetical list of membership,
shall be followed.’ Therefore, the
next State in the list after Switzerland is
indeed the Syrian Arab Republic. It is to be
noted that only the Member States of the
Conference on Disarmament can take decisions
about their Rules of Procedure including
with regard to their rotating
Presidency.'" Ah, leadership under
Antonio Guterres....
Now it
gets worse. After Guterres' spokesmen told
Inner City Press Guterres had no role, now
on May 24 in Geneva Guterres tried to have
it both ways, with a weak statement, only in
French, which the UN distributed
without translating. Some even praised
Guterres for this - which was his goal, to
have it both ways. We'll have more on this.
From the US transcript:
Inner City Press:
Matthew Russell Lee.
MS NAUERT: Okay.
QUESTION: Yeah. So
I wanted --
MS NAUERT: Nice to meet
you.
QUESTION: All
right. I’m glad to be
here. I wanted to ask
you, this is maybe – I don’t
know if it’s in your binder or
not, if – two things I wanted
to ask. One has to do
with Syria’s set to the
president of the Conference on
Disarmament of the UN.
MS NAUERT: Mm-hmm, I saw
that.
Inner City Press: And
Robert Wood, your – yeah, your
ambassador said --
MS NAUERT: Ironic,
right?
Inner City Press: Yeah,
highly ironic. [Wood said]
they’re un – not
qualified. I wanted to
know: Do you have any
ideas yet what that will
mean? Will the U.S. walk
out? Will they not
participate? And I have
one other question for you.
MS NAUERT: Okay.
I’m certainly aware of that
story and that story taking
place. That would be an
outrage if Syria were to take
control of that. We have
seen these types of things
happen at the United Nations
before where suspicious
countries, which countries
that run against everything
that an individual committee
should stand for, will then
head up that committee.
I haven’t spoken to Ambassador
Haley about that and what she
may or may not do, so I don’t
want to get ahead of any
decisions she might make.
At least
some response - on the same
day, the UN refused to answer
a single one of Inner City
Press' three questions, after
having evicted
and still
restricting Inner City
Press. We will continue to
cover this. For now, this
Periscope video just after the
State Department briefing.
Watch this site.
***
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