UNITED
NATIONS, March
18 -- A week
after Reuters
and AFP filed
complaints
against Inner
City Press for
having called
them lapdogs
of UN
officials, and
a three days
after the UN
declined to
provide a copy
of the
complaints, UN
officials
entered Inner
City Press'
office at
the UN without
permission and
took
photographs.
When
Inner City
Press,
notified by
another member
of the Free UN
Coalition
for Access,
arrived on the
scene, the
officials were
inside its
office, going
through
papers. In the
hallway, the
president of
the
UN
Correspondents
Association,
Pamela Falk of
CBS, took cell
phone
photographs.
The
pre-text to
search and
photograph
Inner City
Press' office,
without
consent or
notice, was
safety. But
Inner City
Press was
reachable all
day. Inner
City Press had
been at the UN
since 8:30 am,
attending a
briefing on
Afghanistan
also attended
by the chief
of the
Department
of Public
Information.
After
asking
questions at a
press
conference on
the Arms Trade
Treaty --
where Louis
Charbonneau of
Reuters, who
previously
tried to get
Inner
City Press
thrown out of
the UN,
demanded the
first question
for UNCA
-- and the UN
noon briefing,
where only one
other
journalist
asked a
question (and
none of Inner
City Press'
three
questions were
answered),
Inner City
Press returned
to the
Security
Council
stakeout.
But
DPI directed
UN Security to
search Inner
City Press
office, and
let
others up to
UNCA's
president
photograph it.
“They're
just
trying to
provoke you,”
a non-UNCA
member
journalist
remarked.
But it is is
outrage, very
telling of the
UN's lack of
respect for
rights
including the
right to free
press, and
very telling
of the
“leaders” of
UNCA, an
organization
that now seeks
to get
journalists
thrown out of
the UN: the
UN's
Censorship
Alliance. More
to follow.
, 
