As
Ban's UN
Ignores Press
Murders in Sri
Lanka, UNCA
Stokes Hate
Media
By
Matthew
Russell Lee
UNITED
NATIONS,
January 29 --
The position
of freedom of
the press and
freedom of
speech at the
UN and its
partners is
declining
daily.
Thousands of
miles from UN
headquarters
in Sri Lanka,
journalists
rallied to
protest the
killing of
reporters Lasantha,
Sivaram,
Nimalarajan
and
Sugeedarajan,
and the disappearance
of Prageeth.
Inner
City Press has
repeated asked
Secretary
General Ban
Ki-moon's
spokespeople
about these
cases, particularly
that of Prageeth,
since
Ban went to
Sri Lanka in
May 2009.
But the UN has
said little,
and
done less.
Meanwhile
Ban's
Secretariat
continues to
"partner" with
the UN
Correspondents
Association,
which became
known by some
as the UN's
Censorship
Alliance after
it sought to
expel and
dis-accredit
Inner
City Press for
its reporting
on UNCA's
screening of a
Sri Lanka
government
film denying
war crimes.
Click
here
for the story
from
the Sri Lanka
Campaign,
with among its
leaders Edward
Mortimer, the
chief of
communications
of Ban's
predecessor.
UNCA
"leaders" from
Reuters
(Louis
Charbonneau),
Agence
France
Presse (Tim
Witcher)
and Voice of
America tried
to get Inner
City
Press thrown
out of the UN
as a whole.
UN
official
Stephane
Dujarric
thanked
VOA's Steve
Redisch for
his June 20,
2012 request
to
dis-accredit
Inner City
Press.
Only
because the
attempt was
exposed,
including by
use of the US
Freedom
of Information
Act, was Inner
City Press
informed of
the complaints
and arguments
against it.
The UN
provides no
due process.
Since
UNCA is no
longer in any
position to
defend the
rights of
journalists, a
new
organization
has sprung up:
the Free
UN Coalition
for Access.
It has
petitioned the
head of the UN
Department of
Public
Information Peter
Launsky-Tieffenthal to
allow space
for another
organization,
and his
indications
have not been
unpositive.
But
Stephane
Dujarric, in a
January 17
meeting and
since, has
suggested
that DPI wants
to continue to
work,
exclusively it
seems, with
UNCA.
But
here is what
UNCA has
become: it
continued
Tuesday
defacing and
counterfeiting
FUNCA flyers
which raise
substantive
issues about
journalists'
rights
at the UN,
from due
process to the
nitty-gritty
of
non-resident
correspondents'
right to equal
access to
information
including in
the
Delegates'
Lounge.
While FUNCA
last week
asked Peter
Launsky-Tieffenthal and
Dujarric to
either open
the glassed in
"UNCA"
bulletin board
for posting by
all or to
permit a FUNCA
board, no
answer has
been
provided.
Launsky-Tieffenthal was
asked about
this,
repeatedly, on
Tuesday, after
earlier it had
been posed,
not
anonymously
but without
any response,
in reply
to Dujarric's
post of a
cartoon of the
French
President.
This can't be
bad form: Dujarric
tweeted-at
Inner City
Press in December,
defending the
UN and
Security
Council.
At least in
those cases,
no one was
anonymous.
Now UNCA
"leaders" have
created
counterfeit
social media
accounts and
used them to
subcribe to or
follow
Permanent
Missions to
the UN and
other
journalists,
hoping for
reciprocity.
Several
UN
journalists on
Tuesday told
Inner City
Press this
disgusts them.
But the new
president of
UNCA, Pamela
Falk, has done
nothing as the
organization
had become
even worse
under her less
than one month
tenure.
Falk
was present at
an exhibit
opening about
Libya on
Tuesday night,
chatting with
UNCA's
(censorship?)
partners in
DPI, at an
event
featuring
among other
Ban's Deputy
Secretary
General Jan
Eliasson,
who is
supposedly
studying the
UN's inaction
in Sri Lanka
in 2009.
What
is he doing
-- including
on press
freedom and
multiparty
democracy
issues?
To
come full
circle, the
UNCA "leaders"
in their
counterfeit
social media
account have
raised, as was
done in an
UNCA Executive
Committee
meeting in
2012, fueling
Sri Lanka hate
media and
death
threats, the
spurious issue
of funding by
the Tamil
Tigers, which
don't even
exist anymore.
It's
false -- but
that a
supposed
"journalists
organization"
would try to
link
competitors
with such a
group, and
continue for
now
to be
partnered with
by Ban
Ki-moon's UN,
is telling.
Watch this
site.
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