UN Votes Denied
for Non-Payment to Yemen &
E. Guinea, Libya & Suriname,
As DPRK Paid in Swap
By Matthew
Russell Lee, NK letter to UN here
UNITED NATIONS,
February 12 – As North Korea
says it can't pay its 2018 UN
dues because of sanctions on
its banks, there are 14 other
UN member states at least two
years behind in their dues payments,
according to Secretary General
Antonio's letter less than a
month ago. While four of these
countries got exemptions from
losing their voting power in
the General Assembly, ten were
stripped of their votes,
including oil-rich UN Security
Council member Equatorial
Guinea. The other countries
listed as denied votes for
failure to pay are Libya, also
under UN sanctions; Venezuela,
Suriname, Grenada, Dominica,
Dominican Republic, Marshall
Islands, Central African
Republic and Yemen, being
bombed by Saudi Arabia. The
four that got exemption and
can still vote are Sao
Tome and
Principe, Comoros,
Somalia and
Guinea-Bissau,
the latter two
also on the
agenda of the
UN Security
Council.
While the Democratic Republic
of Korea, North Korea's official
name, last year paid its UN
dues as a "swap," for this
year's $180,000 it has told
the UN that sanctions are
prohibiting the transfer and
asks that the UN take action.
Vice Minister Pak
Myong Guk
wrote to UN
Department of
Management
chief Jan
Beagle, in a
letter
obtained by
Inner City
Press and
available in
full here
on Patreon,
that "Last
year we paid our contribution
to the UN in the form of swap
with the operation expenses of
the UN agencies in the DPRK,
purely out of its position to
honor its obligation as a UN
member state, but it is an
abnormal method which cannot
be applied continuously in
view of our state law and
regulations. I would like to
kindly request the UN
Secretariat to take measures,
in
conformity with its mission
with impartiality and
independence as lifeline, to
secure promptly the bank
transaction channel through
which the regular payment of
the DPRK’s contribution is
made possible." We'll have
more on this. Back on January
17 when the UN's Committee on
Relations with the Host
Country met, the
representative of the
Democratic People's Republic
of Korea read a three-page
statement condemning the US
for issuing his Mission to the
UN's tax-exempt card in the
name "North Korea" and not
Democratic People's Republic
of Korea. He said, "We
presumed it would be only a
kind of technical mistake by
the U.S. side, and returned
the card back to the U.S.
mission, while requesting them
to correct that serious
mistake." The statement, which
Inner City Press has
exclusively obtained
immediately after the meeting
(photos here,
full PDF of letter via
Patreon, here)
continued that the U.S.
mission replied, "It seems to
be a glitch in our database,
we'll reach out to our office
in DC." That was on December
13, the statement said,
continuing: "on 14th December
there was an explanation from
the U.S. mission informing
that, quoted as 'Our DC office
has indicated that all country
/ mission names on OFM
credentials for Democratic
People's Republic of Korea
indicate North Korea which is
the conventional short
abbreviation. The short name
for the Democratic People's
Republic of Korea is North
Korea, so the tax card will
remain the same." The
statement concluded by
condemning "such reckless
political hostile policy" and
demanded an apology. Watch
this site. Throughout 2016 New
Zealand documentary maker
Gaylene Preston and her crew
staked out the UN Security
Council along with Inner City
Press, awaiting the results of
the straw polls to elected Ban
Ki-moon's sucessor as UN
Secretary General. Preston's
focus was Helen Clark, the
former New Zealand prime
minister then in her second
term as Administrator of the
UN Development Program.
Preston would ask Inner City
Press after each poll, What
about Helen Clark's chances?
Suffice it to say Clark never
caught fire as a candidate.
Inner City Press told Preston,
as did many other interviewees
in her documentary “My Year
with Helen,” that it might be
sexism. But it might be power
too - including Samantha
Power, the US Ambassador who
spoke publicly about gender
equality and then in secret
cast a ballot Discouraging
Helen Clark, and praised
Antonio Guterres for his
energy (yet to be seen).
Samantha Power's hypocrisy is
called out in Preston's film,
in which New Zealand's
Ambassador complains that
fully four members of the
Council claimed to be the
single “No Opinion” vote that
Clark received. There was a
private screening of My Year
With Helen on December 4 at
NYU's King Juan Carlos Center,
attended by a range of UN
staff, a New Zealand designer
of a website for the country's
proposal new flag, and Ban
Ki-moon's archivist, among
others. After the screening
there was a short Q&A
session. Inner City Press used
that to point out that
Guterres has yet to criticize
any of the Permanent Five
members of the Council who did
not block him as the US,
France and China blocked
Clark, with Russia casting a
“No Opinion.” And that
Guterres picked a male from
among France's three
candidates to head UN
Peacekeeping which they own,
and accepted males from the UK
and Russia for “their” top
positions. Then over New
Zealand wine the talk turned
to the new corruption at the
UN, which is extensive, and
the upcoming dubious Wall
Street fundraiser of the UN
Correspondents Association,
for which some in attendance
had been shaken down, as one
put it, for $1200. The
UN needed and needs to be
shaken up, and hasn't been.
But the film is good, and
should be screened not in the
UN Censorship Alliance but
directly in the UN Security
Council, on the roll-down
movie screen on which failed
envoys like Ismail Ould Cheikh
Ahmed are projected. “My Year
With Helen” is well worth
seeing.
***
Your
support means a lot. As little as $5 a month
helps keep us going and grants you access to
exclusive bonus material on our Patreon
page. Click
here to become a patron.
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
Other, earlier Inner City Press are
listed here,
and some are available in the ProQuest
service, and now on Lexis-Nexis.
Copyright 2006-2018 Inner City
Press, Inc. To request reprint or other
permission, e-contact Editorial [at]
innercitypress.com for
|
,
