Of
Samoa, SIDS
& UN
System Travel,
World Bank
& Suits,
Haiti
Stonewall
By
Matthew
Russell Lee
UNITED
NATIONS, June
23 -- In
September to
Samoa, UN
Secretary
General Ban
Ki-moon is
taking 20
heads of UN
system
agencies for
the third
conference of
the Small
Island
Developing
States, SIDS.
On
June 23 Inner
City Press
asked Samoa's
Ambassador
Ali’ioaiga
Feturi
Elisaia about
what
Seychelles'
Finance
Minister
Pierre Laporte
said
this month at
the World
Bank, that
donors should
step up and
that per
capita income
shouldn't be
over-emphasized,
with island
states with
small
populations. Video
here, from
Minute 18:45.
Ali’ioaiga
Feturi
Elisaia
replied that
the World Bank
is a good
partner; UN
DESA's Wu
Hongbo said
pragmatically,
“We will know
when the time
comes what
they bring to
the table.”
Last
month Inner
City Press was
informed by
World Bank
whistleblowers
that, as one
of them
exclusively
told Inner
City Press:
“The
World Bank
President, the
one who used
to work at
Dartmouth,
took a
private jet to
get some
custom-made
suits in Asia
(12 or 13).
Then he
expensed them
as if they
were his
presidential
uniforms. The
Accounting
office in
Chennai where
all travel and
business
expenses
are audited,
scrutinized
and approved,
rejected his
submission. He
turned around
and issued a
complaint
against the
accounting
office to
the Ethics
office, which
told him to go
and take a
hike and to
pay
for his own
wardrobe.”
This
is emblematic
of the UN
system under
Ban Ki-moon,
where basic
accountability
question
aren't even
answered, like
Inner City
Press'
June
20 written
question to
Ban's two top
spokespeople,
“please
confirm or
deny asap that
the Secretary
General got
handed or
served
with legal
papers in one
of the Haiti
cholera
lawsuits, on
information
and believe
this morning
near the Asia
Society?”
Receiving
no
answer at all,
even three
days later,
Inner City
Press asked
spokesman
Dujarric, who
denied Ban is
evasive, but
did not
explain
his office's
failure to
answer this
basic
question.
Now
they will all
fly around.
Will any more
questions be
answered?
Watch
this site.
Footnote:
While
Inner City
Press thanked
Wu Hongbo --
as it turned
out, for his
honesty -- the
bigwig duo of
old UN
Correspondents
Association
asked
questions they
would not
report on, on
CBS or the
Huffington
Post, and
tried to block
another
journalist's
question
about marine
sanctuaries,
tomorrow's
topic, see
video here
at Minute
23:08.
Maybe these
bigwigs of the
UN's
Censorship
Alliance
can go on
the UN's
junket too,
since they're
already given
a big room,
even as
actual working
journalists
are thrown
out, that they
leave empty.
UNreal.
* * *
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reports
are
usually also available through Google
News and on Lexis-Nexis.
Click here
for Sept 26, 2011 New Yorker on Inner City
Press at UN
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for
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Corruption
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