Absent
from Press
Q&A on
Syria, UNCA
Officials
Conceal
Complaint
Information
By
Matthew
Russell Lee
UNITED
NATIONS,
May 27 -- Amid
a series of
press
stakeouts on
Syria on
Sunday at the
UN, in the
parallel world
of the UN
Correspondents
Association's
top officials,
the "urgent"
move to expel
Inner City
Press
persisted
without
disclosure.
This is a case
of big
wire services
seeking to use
a supposed
journalistic
organization
to expel a
smaller media
they have used.
UNCA
President
Giampaulo
Pioli, who on
May
25 issued a
notice of a
May 29 session
to
appoint a
"Board of
Examination"
to try to
expel
Inner City
Press, did not
come to the UN
to cover the
Security
Council
session
on the
killings in
Houla.
His
Vice
President Lou
Charbonneau of
Reuters, who
on May 21 was
bylined
on a
Reuters story
stealing
without credit
an Inner City
Press exclusive
of
March 28 that
US official
Jeffrey
Feltman would
come to work
for
the UN, did
come to the UN
and even sat
at the
multiple
stakeouts.
But he did not
ask any
questions,
preferring to
use the
information
gleaned by the
questions of
others.
Foreign
Policy's The
Cable,
for example,
credited
Inner City
Press, but
Reuters did
not. At the
stakeout on
Sunday, a
Russian UN
correspondent
thanked Inner
City Press for
another
exclusive
report which
he said he'd
used and
credited.
Charbonneau
has said that
he has a
POLICY of not
crediting
Inner City
Press
exclusives, a
statement that
Reuters has
yet to respond
to.
For
the record,
Inner City
Press asked
questions of
and got
answers from
the UN
Ambassadors of
the UK, Syria,
Germany,
Russia and
France --
whose
Mission's
tool Tim
Witcher of
Agence France
Presse was
seen near
the
stakeout, but
who asked no
on the record
questions.
Nor
did Pioli
respond to
Inner City
Press' sixth
request that
he provide the
names
of the five
UNCA Executive
Committee
members he
said had in
writing
requested the
Board of
Examination to
try to expel
Inner City
Press.
Since
under UNCA's
rules this
Board must be
"impartial,"
it seems clear
that
none of the
five
complainants,
nor in context
any
correspondent
which
has used an
Inner City
Press
exclusive
without
credit, can be
on the
Board of
Examination.
It is also
clear that
Inner City
Press, as
defendant,
must have a
role in
selecting the
Board,
including
making
nominations
and striking
nominees if
necessary for
cause.
None
of this is
possible
without known
who are the
complainants,
and the
supposed
victims. But
despite Inner
City Press
explaining
just this in
its
request to
Pioli, no
names have
been provided.
Inner City
Press did not
used to
routinely
cover these
people, for
the purposes
of
collegiality.
But when big
media says it
has a POLICY
of not
crediting
smaller media,
and tries to
get it
expelled, the
need for such
coverage comes
into focus.
Presumably
Charbonneau,
who also filed
a stealth
complaint with
the UN Media
Accreditation
and Liaison
Unit which
controls media
access to the
UN,
is one of the
five
complainants.
Why not just
give the
names, then?
Under his
behind the
scenes control
of the UNCA
Executive
Committee,
UNCA has
become
positively
Kafka-esque.
Watch this
site.
, 
