Argentina
Bragged of UNSC
Venezuela Meeting Nov
13,
UNSG
Guterres Spox
Won't Confirm
By Matthew
Russell Lee, Photos
UNITED NATIONS,
November 9 – When Inner City
Press went to the UN's 38th
floor for Argentina President
Mauricio Macri's 5:30 meeting
with UN Secretary General
Antonio Guterres on November
7, it expected that Guterres
would issue a read-out
afterward, as he should. But
he did not. Instead, Argentine
foreign minister Jorge Faurie
spoke, bragging that there
will be a UN Security Council
meeting about Venezuela on
November 13, with OAS
Secretary General Luis Almagro
being heard. Inner City Press
later asked the President of
the UN Security Council
Sebastian Cardi, who said he
"thinks" it's an Arria formula
meeting. Then at noon on
November 9, Inner City Press
asked Guterres' spokesman
Stephane Dujarric, UN
transcript here: Innner City
Press: The meeting with
[Mauricio] Macri, the
President of Argentina, they
gave an extensive readout
afterwards. Was it
accurate? Spokesman:
"I'm not able to speak to
that." Why not? Why is
Guterres so untransparent? He
was in Lisbon for three days,
justified by a 15 minute
speech there. His UN is a
circus, still engaged in
censorship. We'll have more on
this. On October 30, there was
a delay. Then suddenly,
instead of Sweden, Guterres
rushed in with Venezuela's
Foreign
Minister Jorge
Arreaza. He
did a fast and
perfunctory
handshake and
rushed into
his office
with Arreaza.
An hour later,
Canada's
foreign
minister
Chrystia
Freeland
bragged how
she and her
Peruvian
counterpart
Ricardo Luna
Mendoza had
met with
Guterres about
Venezuela.
Guterres,
unlike his
predecessor,
issued no
read-outs,
entirely
untransparent.
And what is he
accomplishing?
Based on
Cameroon,
nothing. When
Venezuela's Foreign Minister
Jorge Arreaza took questions
at the UN after meeting
Secretary General Antonio
Guterres, he focused on the
new US sanctions announced
earlier that day. Inner City
Press, covering the UN, asked
about the Guyana land dispute
- and he said, yes, it was
discussed, the process
continued. Guterres' canned
readout said: "The
Secretary-General took note of
the assessment of the
Venezuelan Government
regarding the situation in the
country. The Secretary-General
reiterated his view that a
political solution based on
dialogue and compromise
between the Government and the
opposition is essential, and
urgent, to address the
challenges faced by the
country in a context of
respect for rule of law and
human rights. He
expressed support for ongoing
regional efforts and the work
of the international
facilitators who are assisting
the parties in trying to
reactivate a process of
negotiation. The
Secretary-General and Minister
Arreaza also discussed the
Good Offices Process on the
border controversy between
Guyana and Venezuela."
Venezuela was the topic for
the first time of a UN
Security Council "Any Other
Business" meeting on May 17,
right after another closed
door meeting on Somalia and
Eritrea. The title of the
meeting is “the situation in
Venezuela and efforts by
regional organizations to
resolve the crisis per Chapter
VIII of the UN Charter" and
the briefer will be not USg
Jeffrey Feltman but his
Assistant, ASG Miroslav Jenca.
The request, as announced by
US state media, was by the US
Mission to the UN. This comes
hours after that Mission
declined, at least as of this
report, to answer on the UN's
World Intellectual Property
Organization helping North
Korea with patent filings for
the production of sodium
cyanide, a violation of UN
sanctions. (After that, the
president of the Security
Council for May said he was UNaware
of WIPO, whose North Korea
work is right on its website.)
It is important that the UN
system be held to account, to
end both corruption and
censorship - and as noted
below, its impunity for
bringing cholera to Haiti,
while being cited offering
help on cholera in Venezuela.
Back on May 2 when US Deputy
Assistant Secretary of State
for Western Hemisphere Affairs
Michael Fitzpatrick took press
questions about Venezuela, as
reflected by the transcript,
he called Nicolas Maduro's
plans for a constituent
assembly "corporatist" and
Venezuela's plan to stop
attending Organization of
American States meetings a
"step backward for
themselves." He chided the
government for not accept help
"even from the UN" for medical
issues (the UN, one noted,
introduced cholera to Haiti.)
Fitzpatrick said the US has
been using the OAS its way to
be in contact with Venezuela,
given the lack of an exchange
of ambassadors. The moderator
called in order on Reuters,
EFE and Bloomberg, then CNN en
Espanol and CBS; Fitzpatrick
declined to say if Secretary
of State Rex Tillerson would
attend the planned ministerial
meeting of the OAS, saying the
date and location have not yet
been selected. Back on
April 20 after US Vice
President Mike Pence announced
that Donald Trump will attend
ASEAN and related meetings
this November, the State
Department held a half-hour
telephone press briefing by
Deputy Assistant Secretary of
State for Southeast Asia
Patrick Murphy. Responding to
a mere five questions, Murphy
began with Voice of America,
answered a Malaysian outlet's
question about visas to the US
from that country and then
told Reuters the US will
continue its freedom of
navigation operations. The
issue of human rights, raised
this week in the UN Security
Council session by Ambassador
Nikki Haley, was not
addressed, though a question
was taken about the
Philippines anti-drug
controversies. Even of the
five questions, many were
deferred to others in consular
affairs or the Department of
Defense. As to the UN,
early reports on possible
Trump administration budget
cuts have triggered push-back
by former State Department
staffers, some using pseudonymous
Twitter accounts.
Back on
March 2 holdover Assistant
Secretary for International
Narcotics and Law Enforcement
Affairs, Ambassador William
Brownfield on the record
insisted that the US'
relationship with the United
Nations is excellent. He cited
an upcoming UN conference
later this month at which he
said he will be representing
the United States. We'll see.
Meanwhile
on March 1, despite the
billions of dollars the US
gives to the UN, the UN
website was down for hours, no
one seemed to care. At the UN,
the Department of Public
Information under Cristina
Gallach used public funds, one
quarter from the US, for a
training to tell
DPI-accredited NGOs that Detroit,
Michigan is a "third rate
city" in "flyover country;"
DPI had already evicted and
continues to restrict the
investigative Inner City Press
which alone reported on the
dissing of Detroit, and other
UN corruption.
On US
inauguration day on January 20
at the US Mission to the UN
the photos of Obama, Biden,
Kerry and Samantha Power came
down. As of February 17 they
have not been replaced.
But as elsewhere an
"Alt USUN" Twitter account
continues in a parallel online
universe the views of Power,
most recently
calling out new Ambassador
Nikki Haley for only attending
three of 13 UN Security
Council meetings, on Ukraine,
ISIS and Israel - Palestine.
Fair
enough. But how many meetings
did Samantha Power attend? And
after the Israel - Palestine
meeting Nikki Haley took questions
at the Security Council
stakeout, not pre-screened by
Power's spokesman Kurtis
Cooper - who remains at the US
Mission, tweeting, along with
many others.
In fact,
Isobel Coleman who did nothing
when the DC-based
whistleblower protection group
Government Accountability
Project wrote to her about the
UN's eviction of the
investigative Press, here,
still as of February 17 lists
herself as the US
representative on UN reform.
Is it true?
In
the UN itself, Obama and
Hillary Clinton nominee
Jeffrey Feltman has gotten his
UN contract extended. Inner
City Press first
reported, from multiple
sources, that Feltman sought
this so that his UN pension
would hit the five year
vesting dateline. The UN's
holdover spokesman Stephane
Dujarric called Inner City
Press' question, and by
implication Inner City Press,
"despicable."
Or is that, deplorable?
Meanwhile
Voice of America, which was
shown under the US Freedom of
Information Act to have asked
the UN to throw out the
investigative Press, has now
asked about Jared Kushner
(video via
here) and asked the UK
about Nikki Haley's
inexperience. Like we said, an
alternative universe.
Other
former State Department
officials like Bathsheba
Crocker wring their hands
about changes in foreign
policy. But what did they do,
when the UN killed 10,000 plus
people in Haiti with cholera?
They had their time to try to
improve the UN, and largely
failed. It's time to #MoveOn.
***
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