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As UN Bans Inner City Press E-Asks Spox Dujarric of Cameroon Tiananmen New UN Sex Abuses & Blogger SG Censorship 600+ UNanswered

By Matthew Russell Lee, CJR Letter PFT Q&A, NY Post

UNITED NATIONS GATE, June 4 – Inner City Press on July 5 was banned from entering the UN, the day after it filed a criminal complaint against UN Security for physically removing it from covering the meeting about the UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres' $6.7 billion peacekeeping budget, as witnessed and essentially cheered on by senior UN official Christian Saunders, tearing its reporter's shirt, painfully and intentionally twisting his arm and slamming shut and damaging his laptop. On August 17, Guterres' Global Communicator Alison Smale issued a letter banning Inner City Press from the UN - for life. With no due process. She and Guterres have put the UN in the US Press Freedom Tracker, here. Smale said, again, that the UN would answer Press questions to the Spokesman Stephane Dujarric and his Office; Dujarric said the same on camera. On June 4 two hours before the UN noon briefing the day after Dujarric when asked for Guterres' comment on Tiananmen Square 30 years anniversary said "No, I have no particular comment on that," Vine video here, Inner City Press submitted 898 questions, including why it continues to be lawlessly banned from entering to ask questions in person: "There are more than 500+ questions UNanswered. And Monday Sept 17, Tuesday Sept 18, Wed Sept 19 and  Thurs and Fri Sept 21, that whole week, no questions answered. Nor Sept 25, nor 28th - nor October 2 nor 3. While appreciating and using what was belatedly sent on May 20 about sexual exploitation allegations and on March 28 in partial request to Inner City Press' questions about the UN bribery sentence of Patrick Ho of CEFC and CEFC's 2018 attempt to buy the oil company of Gulbenkian Foundation which paid the SG, no answers on Dec 17 or 18 or 19 or 20 or 21 - another FIVE days in a row, even as SG's direct conflicts of interest and failure to disclose emerge, and a newest low. No answers on January 30 nor 31 nor February 1 nor 4 nor 5 nor 6 nor 7 nor 11 nor 12 nor 13 nor 14 nor 15 nor 18 nor 19 nor 20 nor 21 nor 22 nor 25 nor 26 nor 27 nor March 1 - 27 (!) And now April 1, 3-30 (one answer in the entire month - corrupt), and now May 1-13, 15-17, 21-31, June 3, many questions. No answers at all during those four days of the US v Ho trial showing corruption in the UN says it all. This ban is just censorship - and Inner City Press must be allowed back into the noon briefing to ask its questions in person and follow up on them.  June 4-1: On Cameroon, as Inner City Press asked you on the morning of June 3, what is the SG's comment and action if any on that at least 300 people were arrested in demonstrations in several cities across Cameroon on June 1? The MRC party said its members and supporters were arrested while calling for the release of Maurice Kamto and 150 of their supporters, who were imprisoned late January during protests against October 2018 elections.  Kamto and his supporters have been charged with "hostility against the homeland." They include, simply in Bare Bakem:  YAKOUA Charlotte Claire, SIBAFO Fidèle, TCHAPY Daniel, FOKO Laurent, and SEULEU Clément among many others... 

June 4-2: On China, as Inner City Press repeatedly asked before the Spokesman's "no particular comment" conclusion to the June 3 noon briefing, on Tiananmen Square massacre's 30 anniversary, what is the SG's comment and action if any on that today "Hundreds of uniformed and plainclothes police monitored the square and its surroundings, conducting spot ID checks and inspecting car trunks. Rights groups said authorities had rounded up dissidents in the run-up to the anniversary and had detained, put under house arrest, or threatened dozens of activists in recent weeks.  While no public events to mark the anniversary will be tolerated in mainland China, demonstrators gathered in Hong Kong, a former British colony that returned to Chinese rule in 1997.  There will also be events in self-ruled and democratic Taiwan, which China claims as its own. 

June 4-3: On UN sexual abuse and exploitation, AGAIN as requested on the morning of June 3 immediately disclose what IS the new "allegation of SEA" which the UN on the morning of June 3 announced by e-mail. Clicking through to the UN website, the previously announced case against South Africa peacekeeper is no longer at the top of the page, and it is unclear what the new allegation is. This lack of clarity is unacceptable. Again, please provide any and all hand outs requested in the week ending May 31 after the noon briefing "disclosure" Inner City Press was banned from, and all still withheld if-asked information about these these SEA cases; as previously requested provide all if-asked information for new SEA allegation against South African peacekeeper in DRC uploaded just after the noon briefing on May 30, since Inner City Press is banned from entering to ask at noon briefing. Also as requested provide any and all hand outs on 1st quarter UN SEA statistics, as Inner City Press requested yesterday. Your failure to respond is in context a cover up: note that the journalist Sidy Djimby Ndao contacted Inner City Press about the Senegal allegation, based not on your hidden and not answered on "disclosures" by InnerCityPress.com. Now the lead Spokesman refuses to answer and explain why the SG does not disclose the nationality of international staff accused of sexual misconduct, and of the April 17 regarding Burundi and South Africa peacekeepers and still the Cameroon troops' rape allegations you have not provide any further information on - and now the four cases put online on May 9,four more sexual misconduct cases, declaring three "unsubstanted" including the alleged rape of a child in Guinea Bissau by a UN civilians whose nationality the UN declined to disclose.

June 4-4: On press freedom and Cameroon, what is the SG's belated comment and action if any on that Cameroon’s popular blogger Paul Chouta, arrested by elements of the Judicial Police in Yaounde Tuesday, May 28, 2019 appearance in the the Yaounde Court of First Instance after being detained due to his critical stance against the Biya government / regime? In the UN, what has the accountability been for Lt Ronald E. Dobbins and those those refused on camera to give their names? What is each of yours - particularly the SG's - response to the letter written and sent by Burundi activist Manisha Lievin? To the April 15 letter to the SG, DSG and USG Smale for which receipt has not even been acknowledged, other than a single lawless line from MALU: "Your media accreditation request, with reference no: M66561081, has been declined"? This is a formal request for the UN's explanation of grounds for this denied, and since SGcentral, the SG's chief of staff and Deputy SG and USG Smale haven't even confirmed receipt of the April 15 letter much less responded, for reconsideration. AGAIN, immediately explain how it is legitimate to ban from enter into the UN the media that has been asking about these and other questions, with no hearing or appeal.

May 30-3: On South Sudan, AGAIN, please explain the photographs of Guterres' DSRSG Moustapha Soumaré with UNSC sanctioned Malek Reuben Riak on Peacekeepers' Day. How did this happen? Who invited him? For what purpose? What accountability for this will there be?

May 24-2: On China, what is the SG's comment and action if any - including in light of his still undisclosed connection to CEFC China Energy through its bid for Gulbenkian Foundation's oil company, on that Developed and sold by the China Electronics Technology Corporation, a state-run defense manufacturer, the system in Kashgar is on the cutting edge of what has become a flourishing new market for technology that the government can use to monitor and subdue millions of Uighurs and members of other Muslim ethnic groups in Xinjiang?    

May 15-3: On the Public Financial Disclosures for 2017 belatedly published over the weekend of April 27-28, please state why Mohammed Ibn Chambas, like the Executive Secretary of the UN Biodiversity Convention, Cristiana Paşca-Palmer, UNICEF's Henriette Fore, with documented links to ExxonMobil and others, USG Mark Lowcock (undisclosed while the Secretariat's speaker at the UNSC Arria on Cameroon), UNCTAD's Mukhisa Kituyi, UN Women's Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka, UNOG chief Michael Moller, UNDP chief Achim Steiner,  Heidi Mendoza, Adama Dieng, UN Security chief Peter Drennan, Rosemary DiCarlo and Nicholas Haysum, is not even on the list. OIOS chief Inga-Britt Ahlenius reported - why not Mendoza? Where IS Mendoza? Isn't it a bad practice for the UN's head (anti) genocide definition official to conceal from the public even cursory financial disclosure? Did DiCarlo decline to make any public disclosure despite being the UN's top political officer? What is the even plausible applicability of this line from SG Guterres' web page: "Please note that given the multi-cultural environment of the UN and the often security sensitive locations where UN staff are either working or come from, full public disclosure may not always be a viable or sensible option for certain staff members"? Why has Guterres changed the previous system in a which a "choosing not to disclose" statement was upload and listed, to one which helps conceal who reports and who does not?  Again, state why considering the UN bribery conviction of Patrick Ho of CEFC, and CEFC's attempt to purchase the oil company of Gulbenkian Foundation which paid Mr. Guterres in 2016 was omitted from his online public financial disclosure covering 2016, and why Guterres has not even started an audit of CEFC in the UN. 

More here.

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