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As UN Host Country
Committee Discusses Access, Press is Excluded, by Office of
Legal Affairs
Byline: Matthew Russell
Lee of Inner City Press at the UN: News Analysis
UNITED NATIONS,
April 22 -- The UN's Host Country Committee was in an uninviting mood
on
Tuesday. As a meeting on questions of access to the United States and
the UN
began, the Committee Secretary, Surya Sinha of the UN's Office of Legal
Affairs, approached this reporter. "Inner City Press? You have to
leave."
The agenda for the session, which
does not say "Closed meeting," had only two items: "entry visas
issued by the host country" and "other matters." Previous
meeting have allowed reporters, although few have opted to attend.
There was a
dust-up between Venezuela and the U.S. in September 2006 that BBC,
among
others, was allowed to cover. Click here for
Inner City Press' last article about the Committee, based on openly
attending its January 2008 meeting. Now, the Committee Secretary and
according to his
staff, the Chairman,
claim that the committee's meetings have always been closed.
Inner City Press went and got a
representative of the UN's Media Accreditation and Liaison Unit, who
came and
told the staff that the press should be let in. No, the staffer said,
adding
that the UN 's own Department of Public Information was allowed to
attend, and
would issue a press release.
"But then the meeting isn't
even closed," it was pointed out. "What's the point of excluding
independent, non-UN journalists?"
Host Country Committee - now you see it, now you don't, per OLA
The spokesman for the President of
the General Assembly went in and to his credit tried to inquire into
the
matter. His boss, Srgjan Kerim, has spoken publicly of General Assembly
transparent and reform, and of openness to the press. But the spokesman
emerged
saying that he had not been able to resolve the matter.
The UN's own in-house
press release
of the last meeting, in January, notes the
attendance of officials of the City of New York and of the UN's Office
of Legal
Affairs. As may or may not be related, the head of OLA is Nicolas
Michel, who
has said he will not speak with Inner City Press following reports that
the
$10,000 or more a month he took from the Swiss government while
ostensibly
working only for the UN were not included in his public financial
disclosure. As
to the lawless and standardless closing of meetings, an answer has been
promised, but the meeting has already been missed. Only at the UN...
* * *
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
Feedback: Editorial
[at] innercitypress.com
UN Office: S-453A, UN, NY 10017 USA
Tel: 212-963-1439
Reporter's mobile (and weekends):
718-716-3540
Other,
earlier Inner City Press are listed here, and some are available
in the ProQuest service, and now on Lexis-Nexis.
Copyright
2006-08 Inner City Press, Inc. To request
reprint or other permission, e-contact Editorial [at]
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