After
Morocco Tried to Ban ICP W
Sahara Photos, Gallach's DPI
Makes Bogus Threat, Response
By Matthew
Russell Lee
UNITED NATIONS,
March 22 – The UN's
willingness to censor Press
coverage of itself and its
failures such as in Western
Sahara, including at the
behest of abusive UN member
states like Morocco, shows a
need for radical reform not
currently being attempted much
less achieved. A complaint
conveyed to Inner City Press
on March 22 by the UN
Department of Public Information,
which previously evicted and
still restricts Inner City
Press after it pursued the Ng
Lap Seng UN bribery case in
the UN Press Briefing Room and
regarding DPI's Cristina
Gallach is a case in point.
The
background is that when UN
Secretary General Antonio
Guterres' schedule was updated
on the afternoon of March 17
to add Brahim Ghali,
Secretary-General of the
Frente Polisario at 4 pm,
Inner City Press remained at
the UN Security Council
stakeout working. When the
Polisario delegation,
including UN envoy Christopher
Ross, was escorted to the
elevators at 3:45 pm, Inner
City Press took a photograph
and tweeted
it, along with urging
Guterres' holdover spokesman
Stephane Dujarric to issue a
read-out. But then one of the
Morocco diplomats who had been
hovering around the Security
Council stakeout for hours
went and complained to UN
Security that Inner City Press
had taken a photograph - from
the Security Council stakeout
where it is authorized, and
where at the same time
tourists were taking
photographs. Inner City Press
was encouraged to stop so that
a UN Security supervisor would
be called. (Here's
how UN Security ousted Inner
City Press from the same
stakeout, at the order of
Under Secretary General
Cristina Gallach, audio
here.) This is the
disgusting level of censorship
in today's UN, that must be
reversed.
Now on
March 22 the UN Media
Accreditation and Liaison
Unit, cc-ing superiors in the
Department of Public
Information, has warned Inner
City Pres about "recording...
near the Security
Council. You were
mentioned by name in this
regard, and we take the
opportunity of this sensitive
occurrence to remind you that
the Turkish Lounge is not part
of the stake out area and is
off limits to media unless
invited by the delegation."
One irony
is that Inner City Press never
entered or enters this
so-called Turkish Lounge,
while other insider
correspondents do, including
without any invitation. DPI
has a double standard; Gallach's
record in this regard, on this
issue, has been noted for
example here.
This is pure targeting, and
comes as Inner City Press
continues to question and
cover UN lack
of transparency and lack
of commitment to freedom of
expression, for example in Cameroon.
It is the UN's ongoing lack of
rules, including of due
process for journalists, that
allows this. Inner City Press
has responded, in pertinent
part:
"For your
information, on Friday March
17, I was in the press area of
the UNSC stakeout, after the 3
pm meeting. I took a
photograph of the Polisario
delegation, with Christopher
Ross, going up to the 38th
floor. There were diplomats I
recognized to be from the
Moroccan Mission sitting in
the so-called Turkish Lounge.
I did not record any
conversation or take any photo
of them (although in the past,
Moroccan Ambassador Omar
Hilale has invited me to
photograph him and his
associate there).
After I took and tweeted
photograph of Polisario and UN
official Ross going up, a
Moroccan diplomat / associate
walked the UN Security officer
at the turnstile my pass no
longer works on; the officer
came over and told me,
seemingly apologetically, that
the diplomat can said I
shouldn't take photographs.
I said I was within my
rights to take photographs
from the stakeout, but I
nevertheless - in light of
DPI's / MALU's previous
punitive acts with no
due process, and ongoing
restrictions after more
than 1 year - left the UNSC
stakout.
I consider this complaint by
Morocco to be an attempt to
limit coverage of the Western
Sahara issue. Given DPI's /
MALU's previous actions, if
any of this is put in my /
Inner City Press' history or
file with MALU this must be
included to.
This is a formal request to
see my / Inner City Press'
file. And this is, again, a
request to be returned to
Inner City Press' long time
shared office S-303A, and a
statement for the record that
... Inner City Press' office
and resident correspondent
status must immediately be
restored.
Please confirm receipt and
provided the requested
information / file as well as
the list of those waiting for
office space, the
prioritization the UN has
assigned and the reasons
therefor." Watch this site.
***
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