UNITED NATIONS,
October 12 –
Today's US withdrawal from
UNESCO comes amid a daily
series of votes to choose the
next head of the organization,
now with the candidate from
Qatar ahead with 22 votes and
those of France and Egypt tied
at 18. Inner City Press asked
French Ambassador Francois
Delattre about it. He replied
that the French candidate
Audrey Azoulay is running hard;
this was not included in the
French mission's "transcript"
of the press encounter. Now
Inner City Press' sources tell
it that the Department of
Public Information under
Alison Smale is having a
conference call on Sunday
October 15 about the UNESCO
budget cut and what to do.
We'll have more on this.
Egypt, of course, locks up
journalists; its candidate is
Moushira Khattab. Then again,
UN DPI now under Smale has
ghoulishly chosen to try to
give the long time office of
investigative Inner City Press
to an Egypt state media Akhbar
al Yom which never asks
questions and rarely comes in
(only in order to pretend to "pool"
Sisi's meeting with the
Secretary General, as Akbhar
al Yom's Saana Youssef did, to
block real Press coverage, see
here).
On the culture beat: when the
most main of mainstream media
covers the UN, run for cover.
The New Yorker this week has a
blow-by-blow account of Rex
Tillerson with Javad Zarif
inside the UN Security Council
consultations room, a meeting
their Dexter Filkins couldn't
possibly have been at. But
there is no attribution, even
to sources who spoke on
condition of anonymity, for
whatever reason. Meanwhile CBS
chimed in with its season
opener of “Madame Secretary”
at UN General Assembly week,
denouncing “mere bloggers” for
questioning her about a death
of a Timor-Leste minister
right in front of her. In real
Hollywood Harvey Weinstein,
with an assist from Lisa
Bloom, has flamed out; no one
has mentioned Weinstein's UN
connections, for example here.
It's a circus, in which mass
killings like those taking
place these days in Cameroon
are ignored, by UN Global
Communicators obsessed with
the past European jobs. The UN
may be swept out, Rotten
Tomatoes style, but for all
the wrong reasons. To be
continued. It is telling that
the new pro-UN book "A Worldly
Affair," though copyrighted
2017, does not even mention
the 2016 UN bribery scandal of
former President of the
General Assembly John Ashe,
much less now convicted briber
Ng Lap Seng. It does however
praise Antonio Guterres, who
came in as Secretary General
in 2017, and acknowledge Maher
Nasser, who moderated an event
promoting the book, and
shouting down the Press which
asked about Ashe and Ng. Haiti
is mentioned in connection
with Brooklyn - diplomats
living there, and "Albanians
in The Bronx." It is an
essentially elitist book, with
a sidebar o the UN's mansion
at 3 Sutton Place, bought in
1972 for Kurt Waldheim and
renovated at a cost of $4.5
million for Ban Ki-moon. It
derides the cheap construction
of Uganda House, and laughs at
the penthouse in Libya House
shown by Ali "Treiki." For
weeks the UN promoted its book
event featuring author Pamela
Hanlon.
But when Inner
City Press went and asked
about the UN having brought
cholera to Haiti and paid
nothing, and whether Haitians
in Brooklyn had been able to
get any accountability from
the UN, there was no answer.
A heckler in the
audience said loudly that the
question was not appropriate.
Video here.
So Inner City Press followed
up on Ms. Hanlon's statement
that the land under the UN is
still US territory. If so,
what of John Ashe selling
diplomatic posts from inside
his UN General Assembly
President's office, and Inner
City Press for covering the
scandal being thrown out onto
First Avenue by eight UN
Security officers? Audio here.
(NYPD told Inner City Press it
has no jurisdiction to take
criminal complaints, even for
assault, for anything east of
the First Avenue curb.)
That question wasn't answered,
either, including by Penny
Abeywardena, Commissioner of
Mayor Bill de Blasio’s Office
for International Affairs.
Instead Maher
Nasser, in charge of the UN
Department of Public
Information from April 1 until
tomorrow, said “it's always
about you” and ended the
event, encouraging those
present to buy books for
signing. And so it goes at the
UN.
***
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