UNITED
NATIONS, May 6
-- After the
UN Security
Council met
Monday about
Jordan's
request for a
Council visit,
French
Permanent
Representative
Gerard Araud
emerged and
said "of
course" the
trip would
not happen,
"China will
block it."
Moments
later,
Chinese Deputy
Permanent
Representative
Wang told
Inner City
Press that
wasn't true,
"we did not
block it." He
said it's
a "refugee
problem, it
should be
solved."
Inner
City Press
asked, if a
Council trip
should also
include
Palestine --
a long
requested trip
that another
member, the
US, has
explicitly
blocked.
Wang
said, "we need
a fuller
discussion."
To
try to resolve
the
inconsistency,
Inner City
Press asked
May's
Security
Council
president,
Togo's
Ambassador
Kodjo Menan,
of Araud's
and Wang's
statements. He
said that as
Council
president he
would not
comment on
that.
A
second
reporter,
another member
of the Free
UN Coalition
for Access,
asked if any
other aspect
of the Syria
issue had been
discussed.
(Earlier
today, Inner
City Press wrote,
and at noon
asked, of
Carla
Del Ponte's
statement of
strong
suspicious of
sarin gas use
- by the
opposition).
Menan
said no, only
the trip was
discussed. And
so it
goes at the
UN.
Footnote:
After
a newsy
morning in the
Security
Council --
Eastern Congo,
Abyei
and Syria /
Jordan -- the
only questions
asked at the
Council
stakeout were
by FUNCA
members. This
was true when
UN
Peacekeeping
chief Herve
Ladsous
emerged, too.
One
FUNCA member
asked, very
politely, if
Ladsous would
do a stakeout
(as
for example
his
predecessor
Alain Le Roy
would have
done, if a
peacekeeper
was killed.)
Ladsous said
no. (This is a pattern: see video here.)
Inner
City Press
then
asked, also
politely, if
his UNISFA
mission had
given
notification
of
its travel.
Ladsous
refused to
answer. Moment
later at the
stakeout,
Menan
said it would
be for Ladsous
to answer that
question. Yes,
it
would be.
Another
spoon-fed
briefing?
Watch this
site.
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