In Other Media-eg New Statesman, AJE, FP, Georgia, NYT,  Azerbaijan, CSM Click here to contact us     .

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

UNITED NATIONS GATE, July 25 – 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 July 25 more than three hours before the UN noon briefing by Deputy Farhan Haq before which he for the third day refused to answer written questions about UN child rape in DRC, here and said he was speaking "in the Secretary General's voice," like a ventriloquist -- Dujarric is away on vacation for the whole month of July -- Inner City Press submitted 1068 questions, including why it continues to be lawlessly banned from entering to ask questions in person: "There are more than 700+ 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 3-28, and July 1-2, 8-24 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. 

July 25-1: On Yemen and ("autonomous") weapons sales, what is the SG's comment and action if any, after he's moved the Saudi and UAE led coalition to his "good child killers" list, on that  a large shipment of Australian-built remote weapons systems left Sydney airport?  Reported photographs confirm the identity of the buyers – the Saudi Arabia and United Arab Emirates government. Labelling on pallets destined in June for Saudi Arabia’s ministry of interior, specifically the general department of arms and explosives, identify the manufacturer as an Australian firm, Electro Optics Systems (EOS).  The weapons systems shipped to the UAE armed forces’ joint logistics command from Sydney’s international airport were supplied by EOS.  The R400s remote weapons station allows small cannons, guns or missile launchers to be mounted on military and light vehicles and operated remotely.  

July 25-2: On New Zealand, what is the SG's comment and action if any on that this is first time in a number of years independent human rights observers have been sent to an event in New Zealand, at the Ihumātao site, which has been earmarked for a housing development which local iwi oppose? Given his self-serving partnership(s), what is the SG's response to those who now say that Jacinda Ardern's refusal to intervene at Ihumātao is a 'cop-out'? 

July 25-3: On UN (SG) withholding of information about reported UN child rape, as Inner City Press asked you on the morning of July 23 still without any answer, "This is a Press request that you immediately provide all if-asked and additional information about the new allegation of SEA by a Moroccan UN Peacekeeper - apparently, rape of a child - in the DRC, uploaded after 11 am on July 23, including what if being done for the child victim and any steps taken to avoid this constant repetition of abuse despite the SG's ostensible commitments. Inner City Press is asking in writing because banned from briefing and any follow up questions, now for [more than] a year." 

July 25-4: On Cameroon, after the SG took Biya's golden statue and UN Budget Committee favors, what are the comments and actions if any from him and separately DSG Amina J. Mohammed on the protests on July 22 by those Ambazonians illegally detained in Kondengui Central Prison? And the protests since then, amid the SG's typical silence, in the prisons in Buea? 

July 25-5: On the ICAO hack on which Inner City Press has reported including before being roughed up by UN DSS and banned by Guterres, what is Guterres' response to Chinese government hacking, including its impact on him prospectively giving currently open UN posts like UNODC to Chinese nationals? Reference is made to the e-mail of ICAO's chief information security officer, Si Nguyen Vo, that the laptop of a former ICAO IT officer, Maxim Aliu, was infected while he was on a trip to the agency's regional office in Beijing in 2010. Maxim Aliu is the son of ICAO's current council president, Olumuyiwa Benard Aliu, who was Nigeria's representative on the council in 2010.  Vo's email refers to Maxim Aliu as "patient zero." It describes how, through the IT officer's laptop, the cyberespionage group known as Emissary Panda infected the ICAO network.  Emissary Panda is a sophisticated and stealthy group with ties to the Chinese government.  

July 25-6: On press freedom and Cambodia, what is the SG's belated comment and action if any now that on July 26, 2019, the Phnom Penh Municipal Court will begin the trial of journalists Uon Chhin and Yeang Sothearin on espionage charges? On November 14, 2017, Cambodian authorities arrested them. Four days later, the Phnom Penh Municipal Court charged both with supplying a foreign state with information prejudicial to Cambodia’s national defense under article 445 of the criminal code, an offense punishable by a prison term of 7 to 15 years... Now that the US Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit has ruled against public officials blocking critics on Twitter even if the official claims their account is private, what is the justification for UNSG Spokesperson Stephane Dujarric, with the UN flag in his profile photo and Guterres promoting content, blocking Inner City Press? What is SG Guterres' response / reaction to UN DSS and Guterres' actions on Inner City Press being listed in the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker. 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.

June 14-5: Since the SG claimed publicly that the mansion he lives in "cannot" be sold, please immediately provide any and all documents with such a restriction, and separately explain why the concept of cy pres or reformation of donor intent has not been explored. Separately,  Boutros Boutros Galli wrote in his book that the building was given by Arthur Houghton through the United Nations Association of the USA. What actual inquires, with UNA-USA or any successor to Houghton or Corning Glass, has Guterres made? 

June 11-1: On Cameroon, what is the SG's comment and action if any on this report from Chinese state media: "YAOUNDE, June 10 (Xinhua) -- Cameroon's House Speaker of National Assembly Cavaye Yeguie Djibril on Monday denounced foreign interference in the country's internal affairs which he referred to as "conspiracy."  "Cameroon has become an object of conspiracy intended to destabilize the country. To justify their interference in internal affairs, the conspirators pretend to denounce it." Again, how many offices / desk does the Secretariat give to Chinese state media inside the UN? 

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.

***

Feedback: Editorial [at] innercitypress.com

Past (and future?) UN Office: S-303, UN, NY 10017 USA
For now: Box 20047, Dag Hammarskjold Station NY NY 10017

Reporter's mobile (and weekends): 718-716-3540

Search innercitypress.com  Search WWW (censored?)

Other, earlier Inner City Press are listed here, and some are available in the ProQuest service, and now on Lexis-Nexis.

 Copyright 2006-2019 Inner City Press, Inc. To request reprint or other permission, e-contact Editorial [at] innercitypress.com for