At
UN, Civil Society Questions
Pre-Screened on SDGs at HLPF,
Austrian of IPU Says “Crazy”
By Matthew
Russell Lee
UNITED NATIONS, July
19 – While the UN on its
Sustainable Development Goals
for three days this week held
a “High Level Political Forum”
in New York, when Inner City
Press asked a panel of
indigenous representatives on
the first day about their
rights to participate, the
answer was discordant. It
turns out that civil society
could only question the
Voluntary National Reports
being presented by submitted
questions in advance, to be
pre-screened.
That is
censorship, now too common at
the UN.
While outgoing UN Department
of Economic and Social Affairs
official Wu Hongbo told Inner
City Press the censorship was
due to the limited size of the
UN building, when Inner City
Press asked an International
Parliamentary Union panel on
July 19, the answers were
different.
Austrian
parliamentarian Petra Bayr
said that it was “crazy” to
pre-screen questions. IPU
President Saber H. Chowdhury
predicted things will get
better in the next HLPF. And
IPU staff, after its Secretary
General Martin Chungong
said nine parliaments were
asked and three had input,
later told Inner City Press
that these three were:
Indonesia, Luxembourg and
Thailand - and, it seems,
Togo. We hope to have more on
this.
***
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