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Gordon Brown in Sea of Snubs, In Private Press Conference, Zim
Election Observers Called For
Byline: Matthew Russell Lee of Inner City Press at
the UN: News Analysis
UNITED
NATIONS, April 16, updated April 17
-- For Gordon Brown at the
UN on Wednesday, it was a morning of snubs. His meeting with South
Africa's
Thabo Mbeki was cancelled. He in turn cancelled his
previously-announced press
conference for all UN correspondents. Rather, he blew by the stakeout
with an
entourage of two dozen, on his way to a room in the basement to speak
only with
the British traveling press.
"How
can they do this?" Inner City Press asked the UN staffer controlling
access to Brown's briefing.
They booked the
room, was the subsequent
answer.
When?
Initially
it was just to leave their bags in. Then, an hour and a half ago, they
said
they wanted to use it for this.
"Booking
rooms by the hour, like a hot sheet motel," another correspondent
grumbled afterwards.
When
Gordon Brown came out, Inner City Press asked him if he had met with
Mbeki. He
nodded and smiled. Inner City Press asked, "No snub?"
"No
snub," one in his entourage replied. And then they were gone, down to
lunch with Michael Bloomberg and to meet with Wall Street bankers.
Gordon Brown and Ban, rental agreeement not
shown
A
source who was in the Brown presser reports the emphasis inside was on
a two
hour meeting earlier in the week, as the rebuttal of the snub. Outside,
a five
minute "brush-by" was described. Ah,
diplomacy....
The
substance kept secret, it's said, was a call
for international observers of any second round of voting in Zimbabwe.
We'll
have more on this -- when we can.
Update of 1:55 p.m. --
The
UK's Lord Malloch Brown, stopping in the hallway to speak with
reporters, phrased it this way, "Don't build cheat on cheat." If the
first round was irregular, a second round is not the solution. He said
that sending UN elections observers would not require a Security
Council vote, but would require the invitation or consent of Zimbabwe's
government.
He declined to
comment
on allegations in the British legislature that one or more of the
Zimbabwe resident representatives of the UN Development Program, which
he used to head, have accepted favors and even land from Robert Mugabe.
One doesn't comment on the personnel practices of an agency one no
longer works for, he said. He referred to a denial on UNDP's web site
-- so, he remains at minimum an observer. So how about the exponential
growth of "cost sharing," which he promoted, leading now to a situation
where UNDP expends more in Latin America than in African, with over 90%
of UNDP's expenditures in Latin America consisting of little more than
doing the bookkeeping (and rule evasion) for a government's programs in
its own country? More on this to follow.
Update of April 17, 2:20 p.m. --
while Inner
City Press at the April 16 UN noon briefing asked
There was a press briefing by Gordon
Brown downstairs, only for the British press, or maybe only for the
traveling
press, because they paid for the room. I
want to know, how does that work? How much did they pay and how does
that work?
Spokesperson: This house belongs
to the Member States. I don't know what
the exact fee is to rent a
room.
Inner City Press: It seems like a
technical thing, but since other journalists here were barred from that
press
conference, I decided that I want to know how much they paid for that
room.
Spokesperson: Okay, we can try
to find the answer.
While the Spokesperson's Office did not provide an
answer in the 24 hours that folllowed, the UK Mission to the UN
contested, not to Inner City Press but to the well-meanin UN staffer
put in the position of keeping the press out, that as a member state
the UK could use the room for free, without paying. The article above
has been modified, as marked in italics, to characterize it as a
"booking" and not a "renting" of the room.
The issue of the exclusion of the press by the UK private press
conference, however, remains. The distinction was not "UN
correspondents out, travelling press in," as select UN correspondent
were, in fact, allowed in, uncontested by the UK mission. It is another
selection process, for which the UK Mission has become known. We'll
have more on this. For now, the rest of the April
16 Q&A on the issue:
Question: Does the UN at least
nominally have a policy
that all press conferences should be open to all accredited
journalists, and
does it at least frown upon, or disdain the idea of having press
conferences
limited to journalists of only one nationality?
If so, can that policy be, at least, asserted in
this case?
Spokesperson: In this specific
case, it was not in this
room. This room, 226, is reserved for
press conferences. So...
Question: Do countries have the
right to book rooms by
themselves and give press conferences which are totally private, in
manners of
their own choosing?
Spokesperson: Yes, they do.
Unfortunately, the only thing we can really control
is Room 226. This was already a question
that was raised
before, because one press conference has been held here before, where
the issue
was raised because some correspondents could not get in.
We raised that issue then, and this will no
longer happen. Not here, in 226.
One final footnote: from
within the UK Foreign Office, and not its Mission to the UN, comes a
different theory of snubs, under which the George Bush administration
had Gordon Brown come at the same time as the Pope, in order to make
the U.S. press less interested in Brown. (As noted, only a single
photographer waited for Brown outside the Waldorf Towers on Wednesday.)
This purportedly goes back to Brown characterizing his first meeting
with Bush as "frank," diplo-speak for angry, creating the impression
that unlike Tony Blair, Gordo stood up to W. W's revenge? Gordo's
eclipse by the Pope. A sea of snubs, indeed....
* * *
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
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